


Fair Trade

by Anoke



Series: [Internal Screaming] [1]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: (again mild but present), (i would call it relatively mild but it's there), (non-sexual touching), (so far) - Freeform, Aiden (The Witcher) Lives, Bathing/Washing, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Dehumanization, Eye Trauma, Gen, Human Experimentation, Hurt No Comfort, Mind Control, Minor Character Death, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Non-Consensual Touching, Nonbinary Lambert (The Witcher), Psychological Horror, Shipping is minor in context but present, Slavery, Whump, gender nonconforming Lambert (The Witcher), mad science mages
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:01:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 40,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25129732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anoke/pseuds/Anoke
Summary: Instead of killing Aiden, Jad Karadin takes advantage of Hammond's connections and sells him to a mage looking for a living Witcher.Said mage is very invested in keeping Aiden alive and healthy, but that may turn out to be more curse than blessing, especially when he gets ahold of the notes of a certain Professor Tomas Moreau.
Relationships: Aiden & Lambert (The Witcher), Aiden/Lambert (The Witcher)
Series: [Internal Screaming] [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2082561
Comments: 216
Kudos: 187





	1. Chapter 1

When Aiden had crumpled to the ground Karadin had known it was over. Even if he was still breathing through the slit in his throat he wouldn't be for much longer. Another payday, another step closer to being able to get out of this shit. And yet—

 _Hammond mentioned that mage, didn't he?_ Karadin realized. _The one who came to him looking to be sold a Witcher._

That decided it.

"Hammond, you stay here and help me deal with the body," he said, busying himself removing Aiden's swords and medallion. "Selyse, you get to hold on to the proof. Don't you dare lose any of it. Start heading back."

Selyse took the items with a nod and gestured to Lund and Vienne.

"Wait," Vienne said in that annoying nasal whine of hers. "Why aren't we bringing back the head, like usual?"

Selyse bared her teeth at the elf. "You've been here for three contracts, don't presume you know how we do things. You nearly ruined this one, shooting before we were ready!"

Lund, however, looked at Karadin a little sideways, and Karadin knew he was going to need to explain somehow.

"Witchers," he said blithely. "We imbibe so much toxic shit our corpses are actually dangerous afterwards. I'm not taking the chance that the contract issuer gets poisoned and we get a bad reputation."

Purest bullshit, but it eased everyone's shoulders but Hammond's.

"But then why—" Vienne started up again, and Karadin cut her off.

"Because I'm not treating a whole corpse with lye by myself. Go. Get paid. If you try to cheat us out of our share I'll make you regret it," he said, waving a hand dismissively.

Finally, _finally_ they left.

"Get some pressure on his wounds," he said to Hammond, heading to collect his suture kit.

"Getting sentimental, Jad?" Hammond asked.

Karadin snorted. "Hardly. But the mage who came to you wanting a Witcher— he wanted them _living_ , didn't he?"

That caught Hammond's attention, and he started binding the biggest cuts with cloth.

"Leave his neck for the moment, he's breathing through it and I didn't manage to hit either of the big blood vessels," Karadin said. 

"Gods you Witchers are tough bastards," Hammond said. "You have a plan to stop the mage from blasting me and making off with you _and_ him?"

Karadin waggled a dimeritium bomb in front of Hammond as he bent over to start stitching.

"Just in case, eh?" Hammond said dryly.

"Oh come now, it's not as if we're not expecting Selyse to winkle something extra for herself out of the good Duke's concerned friends." 

"And Lund and Vienne?" Hammond asked, still dry.

"We both know Lund wouldn't have the first clue to do with riches if he had them," Karadin said laughingly. "Vienne, however... " he let his voice go cold. "I don't know if she was trying for a trick shot or if she's too addicted to shoot straight without, but shooting a man and getting hung up on his eye socket is only the latest of her fuckups."

Hammond grunted in approval and started wrapping up the stitched gash as Karadin moved on to the next. When they'd finished with the lesser wounds, sewing up Aiden's throat and cleaning out his left eye socket and binding his arms and legs together after, Karadin wiped his forehead and stretched a bit.

"Now, I'm assuming the mage gave you something to let you contact them?"

Hammond pulled a little wooden token out of his belt pouch. "Snap it in half, t'mage said. Fark checked it, said it wouldn't signal until I did."

“Just in case,” Karadin drawled. He wasn’t really annoyed; that Hammond had mentioned the mage at all showed he wasn’t interested in betraying him, and was probably only keeping it on hand in case Karadin betrayed _him_. “Let me get out of sight, then you can break it.”

Hammond nodded and waited until Karadin had gotten under cover, sword drawn and bomb ready, before breaking the token with a loud, clear _snap!_

It took a minute, but Karadin’s amulet started buzzing and a portal whirled into existence to let a mage through. The man had that nondescript average northerner look; pale skin, dark hair, middling height, a face that wasn’t too sharp or too round. Very forgettable.

“Well, mage,” Hammond said. “I’ve a Witcher for you, if you’re willing to pay.”

The mage looked at Aiden, still slumped on the ground, and frowned.

“I was expecting one in somewhat better condition,” he said.

“You want one in better condition, you can catch one yourself,” Hammond replied.

“He’s missing an _eye_ ,” the mage said, sounding annoyed. “Do you have _any_ idea—” he cut off before he finished the sentence, but that piqued Karadin’s curiosity.

“You wanted a Witcher. This is the only one I’ve got for you,” Hammond said.

The mage narrowed his eyes. “I’ll pay you half of what I originally offered.”

“A lack of _one eye_ and a couple of wounds he’ll heal in two weeks and you’re stiffing me for half?” Hammond said, menacing. “I don’t like it when people go back on their word.”

“The _costs_ that will arise from trying to make up for that lack of an eye—” the mage hissed.

“Three quarters,” Hammond said.

"And what's to stop me from just taking him?" the mage said.

"That would be me," Karadin said, making sure his blade and the bomb were visible as he stalked out of cover.

The mage inhaled sharply, looking at Karadin with far too much interest.

“And I’m afraid I’m not for sale,” he added. “It’s Aiden—” he gestured at the sprawled Witcher with the hand holding the dimeritium bomb, to draw attention to it, “or nothing.”

The mage ran a hand through his hair in obvious frustration and paced back and forth a few steps. Karadin kept on his toes, ready to light and throw the bomb at the slightest warning from his medallion, but the mage didn’t start anything. 

“Fine. Fine!” the mage snapped after a minute, groping at his belt. There was a small buzz from Karadin’s medallion and he tensed, but the mage pulled out a small chest that was clearly remarkably heavy. “Ninety marks, not one more.”

“Take out the thirty and back away, then,” Hammond said.

The mage had to open whatever magic he had in his pocket to put away thirty marks from the chest, but Karadin counted another ninety present, and there didn’t seem to be any magic on them. When he was done, he backed up about five meters.

Hammond and Karadin started stalking in a circular path towards the chest, while the mage just as cautiously approached Aiden. A quick inspection confirmed that the marks appeared to be genuine, while the mage just as cautiously checked over Aiden’s wounds and the bindings on him.

“Everything appears to be satisfactory,” Karadin said after they’d checked fifteen of the marks.

“Indeed,” the mage said, still looking a little disgusted. “Is there a _reason_ he’s missing his swords and medallion?”

“Not included in the purchase,” Karadin said. “Far more useful to me than he is.”

The mage snorted angrily but didn’t argue, which was an interesting bit of information. “Fine. Our business is concluded then.”

Karadin nodded, and all three of them waited on tenterhooks as the mage opened another portal and dragged Aiden through it. Karadin and Hammond relaxed minutely when the portal snapped shut. Hammond let the pieces of the token drop from his hand and Karadin picked up the chest, and they both vacated the area in case the mage decided to send something nasty after them.

“Ninety marks,” Hammond said, a little awestruck.

“Forty-five,” Karadin corrected.

Hammond snorted. “Forty-five of which are mine, yes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this much money in my _life_.”

Karadin hummed. It was more than he’d ever seen, too. With this— he couldn’t keep Leticia in _style_ with it, but it was enough that the idea of marrying her no longer seemed a delirium dream.

“I can get a new ship, hire a second crew, start up an actual trading chain—” Hammond continued, oblivious to Karadin’s own thoughts.

“Are you looking for investors?” Karadin heard himself asking.

“What?” Hammond asked.

“Investors,” Karadin said, an idea taking form. “If I were to give you, say, twenty of mine, would you make me a one-third partner in your business?”

Hammond looked interested, at least. “You’d need to share in some future costs, eventually, but I wouldn’t say no.”

Karadin clapped him on the shoulder. “We’ll draw up an agreement later. For now, let’s go to catch up with the others, before they decide to disappear with our shares.”

Hammond patted him on the back with a grin in return. “I think this is going to be the beginning of a very profitable partnership, my friend.”

* * *

Half a decade later, Karadin looked into the eyes of the Wolf Witcher who’d been meticulously wiping out his old gang in search of him and decided he wasn’t going to give the man an inch. He was going to die anyway. Let him think his _friend_ was dead in return. It was probably even true by this point.

He made an appeal to the Wolf’s white-haired brother—he wasn’t an _idiot_ , he was going to claw for life with his fingernails—but he could tell by the way his gaze hardened that it wasn’t going anywhere.

The shorter Wolf was brutal, but quick. The white Wolf hadn’t even needed to help. Karadin lay in the courtyard of his manor in Novigrad, bleeding out from a perfectly executed neck cut, and wondered, a little bitterly, if five years of happiness had been worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These are Nilfgaardian marks, incidentally. They're not really used as day-to-day currency in the Empire, because they're large and unwieldy and worth way too much to be used in most normal transactions, but in this case, they're a lot easier than pulling out somewhere around thirty thousand orens.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the mage, trying to get an eye that works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V36yLInXxgM  
> "AND THAT ONE'S STILL GREEN!"
> 
> I have my own mental idea of what Aiden looks(/looked) like (https://akilah12902.tumblr.com/image/615095185144168448), courtesy of Dolan Pondsmith (https://www.patreon.com/Pondsmith), but one of the bonuses of Aiden is that he’s almost a complete enigma.
> 
> Also: while I can tell you that the mage has not and will never sexually assault or rape Aiden, there is still a _fuckton_ of purposely-creepy face touching present here.

Aiden was only fully in control of himself in flashes. The mage was careful. Any time he was out of the double cage that the mage kept him in, he was under probably six different compulsion spells. 

“You should really be grateful,” the mage said early on, hooking him up to an intravenous line of something and then tapping Aiden's nose. “Ireneus was a fool, but he at least managed to figure a proper anesthetic for Witchers.”

Ireneus’ failures were a popular topic, especially while the mage was working on his eye. Whatever he was using for surgery was a fairly effective paralytic, in addition to an anesthetic, so Aiden would keep still while the mage replaced an eye or tweaked things or took tissue samples or tested to see if his latest creation was being rejected. He mostly couldn’t even twitch while the substance was drip-fed into his veins. It was _probably_ better than accidentally jerking to the side and wrecking the latest eye the mage had grown, but he was so, so tired of surgery on his eye socket, of the mage testing his eyesight, of the growing collection of scars on the inside of his right elbow.

It took far more lectures about Ireneus' stupidity than it should for Aiden to realize who _his_ test subject was.

 _Kiyan,_ he’d thought, and had started tearing up. The mage had startled when he'd realized, and scolded him while doing some bit of magic or another to make him stop. He'd wiped the tears away with a cloth and showed Aiden he'd been bleeding from his left eye while crying.

"It's clearly not properly set in place; you shouldn't be irritating it like that," he said, tracing a finger along Aiden's cheekbone and frowning. Then he leaned over and adjusted the drip and Aiden couldn't feel him touching his face anymore, which was a mercy when he started adjusting the eye.

The worst part was that he _was_ rather grateful that he wasn’t being tortured into a catatonic state and then used as a housing for a malicious elemental. The only testing that the mage did was figuring out how his latest eye was working, and that mostly wasn’t painful at all, even if it involved a lot more of the mage's hands on his face than he'd like.

The first eye had been… well, terrible. He was pretty sure that he had preferred only having one eye to having two with a massive disparity in clarity, night, and distance vision. He'd been getting horrible splitting headaches and his vision had been so fucked up that he'd bungled a couple of simple tasks, even under the compulsion spells, which was what had alerted the mage to precisely _how_ unsuitable the eye had been. The latest one the mage had grown and placed in his socket was much better, despite still being mismatched, in both capability and color. He personally didn’t care in the slightest about the color—he hadn’t seen his own face in probably years—but the mage’s frustrated muttering while turning his head from side to side to look at his eye told him that _he_ did. And while the mage had complained mightily about the cost of growing new eyes, of the components and gemstones that he needed to attempt to replicate the capabilities of Aiden’s remaining eye, Aiden also knew that even if the mage had produced an eye that worked exactly the same as his usual one but was the wrong color, he would still probably continue to fuck around with the formula until he could make it golden. Aiden was too _recognizable_.

But pickiness about color aside, the mage was good about not harming Aiden when fucking around wth his eye. Sometimes he’d heard the mage cursing out Alzur, Malaspina, and Idarran for their deliberate obscuring of how to replicate their work, and he’d come over and told Aiden angrily about the latest abomination he’d wound up growing from Aiden’s tissue samples and his own component mix. Aiden knew enough about mages to know that there were far, far too many of them who would have tried implanting some of those, and he was grateful at least that this mage had the foresight to realize what a terrible idea that was.

The mage really was, on the whole, not as terrible as he might have been. He fed Aiden enough, and gave him _cooked_ food—fairly appetizing cooked food even, not old or rotting, with actual seasoning. Hell, Aiden's cage was large enough that he could practice sword skills in it with the two swords the mage had given him, and it contained an actual bed and chamberpot and even a few books. The books got swapped out every so often, and he was pretty sure they were from the mage's bookshelf, but it was nice to have something to do besides practice or sleep or soundlessly curse the enchantment that prevented projectiles from entering or leaving the inner cage.

And the mage didn’t _only_ use him for assassinations, at least. Aiden far preferred protection detail. Not just because he hated killing people, but because sometime, someday, the mage would get complacent. And he could not _wait_ for that day to come.

* * *

Aiden heard the mage coming before he actually entered the room, but didn’t bother stopping the sword exercise. The mage worked in the same room as his cage was in sometimes.

“Aiden,” the mage said.

Aiden looked up, feeling the first spell settle into place.

 _Damn it._

Once he was bound with all of them, the mage opened the two sets of doors and Aiden sheathed the sword and walked out.

The mage looked up at him a little wryly before pushing some of Aiden’s hair away from where it was stuck to his forehead with sweat. “Good to see you’re keeping in shape, at least.”

That didn’t require an answer, so Aiden kept quiet.

“I have a task for you,” the mage said. “I’ll be sending you to Metinna. There’s a scholar there who’s collected some research that will be of use, both for your eye—” punctuated with a tap near the outside corner of his left cheekbone— “and for some… additional pursuits.”

Aiden dipped his head in a nod.

“I’ve been attempting to get Master Rollan to sell to me for a month, but he refuses. Such a shame, but he’s had his chance. I’ve prepared a map and some other information for you, along with the usual items.”

The usual items were a few changes of clothes, a dye and makeup kit, money, a token that would let the mage know when he was done with the job, and any other odds and ends that the mage either thought he might need or wanted him to use.

“And do obscure what you take, will you? I would prefer to be cautious rather than have this be traced back to me,” the mage said.

 _Fuck._ Aiden nodded again.

“Probably best if you don’t bathe before you go,” the mage said. “I’ll have one for you when you get back.”

Third time was the charm on acquiescence. The mage opened a portal and handed him the satchel, and Aiden took it and walked through.

He wound up a little ways off a road towards Metinna. Rather than wander in without any idea of what was going on, he opened up the satchel and pulled out the map and the instructions. Master Rollan had a townhouse in one of the nicer sections of Metinna, apparently. The mage wasn’t sure where the research was in the house—he hadn’t been invited in, indicating a certain degree of canniness from the scholar—but he was reasonably certain that it was present there. Aiden was to kill Master Rollan and collect all of the notes written by a Professor Tomas Moreau, and, per verbal instruction, obscure the aim of the theft by whatever method he chose. He didn’t have to let on that there was a Witcher around, which meant that Aiden wasn’t going to let anyone know, if he could. He might not be able to keep to his moral standards but he could at least prevent the public image of Witchers from getting any worse when he was allowed.

He busied himself for an hour or so getting disguised; it was hard to do concealer by feel but he couldn’t help shying away from reflective surfaces. It was evening by then, so he put everything away and headed into the city.

He’d been to Metinna before; Stygga, the ancestral keep of the School of the Cat, was a bit further south, in Ebbing. The familiar streets struck him with a deep longing for when things had been simpler. Before most of the Witchers had been destroyed by mages, and before the Cats had bent rather than break.

His feet took him where he needed to go, even daydreaming as he was. A pass by the exterior of the house showed him several routes up to the upper level, and there was a nearby alley that could serve. He just needed to wait until it was dark, which was easily done with a stop for supper. In a fit of mild pique, he spent most of the money on red pozole with avocado from an eating-house that served that cuisine. Gods, it had been far too long since he’d had avocado or hominy or chiles. The spice of the chiles was even more intense than he remembered, and he wound up sniffling over his bowl with tears streaming down his cheeks, but it was fine, really. It still tasted _amazing_ , and the concealer wasn’t water-soluble.

Night had fallen by the time he left the eating-house, his mouth still burning pleasantly. He had to stop focusing on the sensation all too soon, while swarming up the side of Master Rollan’s house, but it had been nice for a little while. Nostalgic. 

_I wish I could have taken Lambert there—_ he shook off the errant thought. That wasn’t what he was here for.

The scholar’s security was essentially nonexistent. The man himself was still up, reading what looked to be some correspondence with the help of several candles. Aiden got a hand over his mouth and nose and stuck a stiletto into his head at the base of his skull, twisting it a bit to make sure death was as quick as he could make it. The expression on the body was mostly surprised when Aiden withdrew the dagger, to some mild blood spurting, and eased the corpse to the floor. That was better than some of the people he’d had to kill.

He cleaned the dagger and his hand on the man’s tunic and started looking through books and papers, making a small pile of interesting ones. It took him less than ten minutes to find a locking mechanism behind a bookshelf, which led into a small alcove with what were almost certainly the really important documents. Aiden carried everything out into the main room; better to leave as much of an apparent mess as possible.

The documents, if they were labeled or sorted somehow, weren’t done so by a method Aiden was familiar with; he had to sort through them slowly, reading through large portions of the text.

_...afraid I have only managed to further mutate Jerome…_

Even though he was, mentally, at an immense remove, Aiden felt a chill down his spine. He paged through the stack and felt his stomach sink when he saw the name. _Professor Tomas Moreau._ The mage had previously lamented that the Salamandra had been so thoroughly dismantled and their research so completely destroyed—but it looked like someone else had been looking into the same thing. 

His hands were shaking as he tried to do _something—_ knock over a candle, cast Igni, _anything—_ but instead he carefully packed the notes away and tucked them into his satchel.

He could just set the whole fucking place on fire now, as long as he got out alive and with what the mage wanted, but that wouldn't do him any good and _would_ probably hurt the scholar's neighbors, who certainly didn’t deserve to have their block burned to the ground because he was angry.

He wasn’t particularly interested in the other books anymore, but he took the stack he’d originally picked out and all the rest of the hidden papers besides, blew out the candles, and climbed down into the back alley. It took him less than half an hour to get to a spot secluded enough that he could break the token so the mage could pick him up.

The mage was waiting on the other side of the portal, eyes shining with barely-repressed hunger. Aiden, feeling like he was trying to move through swamp mud, pulled Professor Moreau’s notes out of the satchel and handed them to the mage.

“Glorious,” the mage said softly, looking at the notes. Aiden would have been happy if he’d continued to be ignored, but he wasn't that lucky.

“There’s a bath waiting for you,” the mage said, giving him a look of near-equal hunger as he had the research. Aiden knew a command when he heard it, and he headed for the bathing room, dropping the satchel and strewing his clothes everywhere along the way just to be petty about it.

The near-scalding water and the mildly scented soap didn’t manage to calm him down in the slightest. He was furiously scrubbing at his hair when the mage walked in and clicked his tongue in disapproval. Aiden froze.

“Really, you can take a minute to enjoy it. It’s going to be quite some time before I can test everything to my satisfaction and develop what I want to do,” he said. Aiden relaxed into the side of the tub against his will.

“Mmm, you missed a spot,” the mage said, hands coming to rest in Aiden’s hair. “Allow me.”

Aiden couldn’t do anything _but_ , so he sat there limp as the mage rubbed soap through his hair, fingertips rubbing in circles on his scalp, and then rinsed him carefully. Then he did it again.

“Getting to the point where you’re going to need another trim,” the mage said casually. “We can do that tomorrow, perhaps.”

Aiden’s head lolled a bit on his shoulders, which worked well enough in lieu of an actual answer.

“You probably want to get some sleep,” the mage said. “I’ll be at my desk whenever you want to call it a night.”

He withdrew, and Aiden sat in the tub until the water cooled a little bit more, then got up, toweled himself dry, and walked into his cage. There was another set of clothes on the bed, and the swords were on the rack as usual. The only new addition was a stack of books from the scholar’s house, ready and waiting on the bookshelf.

The doors locked into place behind him, and Aiden bit his lip until it bled to keep from going into hysterics. He threw himself into the bed a little harder than he usually did and buried his face in the pillow as his eyes burned. It was going to take him a while to fall asleep tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mm, the horror in being forced to aid in your further inhumanization.
> 
> Yes I know chiles and maize and avocados are native to the Americas but Metinna is a trade city, shh.
> 
> Whoops. Turns out I am feeling the inspiration. Chapter 3 probably will happen sooner than expected.
> 
> OH HEY MORE ART FROM DOLAN PONDSMITH (https://www.patreon.com/Pondsmith)
> 
> LOOK AT THIS SHAGGY BOY https://akilah12902.tumblr.com/post/623204040619229185/so-pondsmithart-took-my-vague-description-request


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to some Witcher 1 game mechanics in addition to the Witcher 3 ones! Look, it’s a lot more interesting that you have to distill certain alchemical components out of monster bits and that you have to get _specific_ monster bits to make mutagenic potions instead of just having to burn through a ridiculous amount of white gull and picking up nicely packaged and labeled ‘mutagens’ respectively, okay? Okay.
> 
> Also, the definition of that pet name: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gib

He'd been hoping that the mage would be too absorbed in Moreau's papers to follow up on Aiden's hair, but his luck wasn't in. He deliberately tuned the man out while he nattered at Aiden about the research; he wasn't delusional enough to imagine that he would be able to convince the mage not to— not to—

"I need your chin up for this part," the mage said, emphasizing by lifting Aiden's head by a curled hand under his chin. Aiden moved with it and tried to focus his mind on something else. 

_Never thought I'd be grateful for Ghouls and Alghouls,_ he thought, a little manic.

"Aiden, what are you thinking about?" the mage asked, and Aiden couldn't help twitching.

 _ **Damn** it, I have to get myself under control._ The mage had only asked him that a couple of times before; thankfully only once at a time when he'd been actively contemplating the mage's death, very early on. 

"The Trials," he said aloud.

“Oh, you needn’t be so concerned. I won’t have to resort to inflicting massive traumatic damage to get this to work, isn’t that excellent?” the mage cupped Aiden’s face with a hand, thumb resting just under his left eye. “You see, the initial set of mutations actually leaves your bodies quite—malleable, as it were. It’s almost trivially easy to introduce new mutagens and induce them to take, if you go about it properly. Moreau was trying to overwrite the mutations with other mutagens that would imitate normal human capabilities, but the chances of that working were always astronomically low.”

That was a nauseating mix of horror and relief. Aiden didn’t particularly want to flirt with death in the way that the Trials had required, but if it was supposedly so _easy_ to mutate him further—

“Actually, I believe that’s part of why I was having so much trouble with your eye,” the mage said, excited now and stroking his thumb along Aiden’s cheekbone. “Eyes aren’t necessarily _simple_ , but between the general mess Alzur left your, well, _coding_ in and the tendency for your body to incorporate other material, they’ve been getting _all_ the wrong instructions on how to grow!

“So, using Moreau’s notes, I’ll come up with a better-fitted eye, and once that’s healed we can move on to other improvements.” the mage said, that terrible light in his eyes again. 

Aiden kept still. It was that or scream, and screaming would shatter the illusion of his compliance.

“It’s going to take a little while to get the eye ready, but I have something for you to do in the meantime,” the mage continued, finally taking his hand off Aiden’s face and getting back to trimming his hair. “There are a number of components that I’m going to need. The most important are eggs of the leucistic scolopendromorphs—giant centipedes—called ‘pale widows’—their albumen is essential for some of the mixtures I need to make. There are reportedly a number of colonies in Toussaint, so I’ll be sending you there. Of course, you’d have to go into a nest to get to the eggs—”

“If I can get ahold of some quebrith and some White Gull I shouldn’t have too much trouble with that,” Aiden said, his tongue betraying him.

“Oh?” the mage said, delighted.

“Strong enough Golden Oriole and their toxins will actually start healing me,” Aiden continued. “Then it’s just Yrden to keep their undersides exposed and swordwork.”

“I do recall you mentioning that about that potion,” the mage said, scissors snipping away. “I know there’s arenaria nearby, if you head up into the mountains, and I have more than enough strong alcohol for the base. Quebrith… The easiest distillation method for that would be from alghoul and graveir bones, correct?”

“It would,” Aiden said.

“I’ll dig out the alcohol and arrange for a lure for some ghouls, then,” the mage said. “In fact, it would probably be best if you stocked up fully on potions, oils, and bombs— I’m going to need quite a few other monster parts as ingredients. You can take some contracts in Toussaint, gather parts and enjoy the country at the same time. In fact, I could do with several cases of wine— you could visit some of the vineyards and attend tastings before you order, perhaps. Your palate—” punctuated with a tap to his philtrum, “could get a pleasant workout.”

Aiden hadn’t been in Toussaint for a _long_ time, but he was fairly sure that he wouldn’t be welcomed to wine tastings. At least it wasn’t enough of an order to force him to point that out.

The mage finished with the scissors and brushed the clippings off of Aiden’s shoulders. “Well, let’s get started then. Will you need anything for gathering your ingredients?”

“Crossbow, waterskin, hunting knife and some containers to put monster parts in would help,” Aiden said, getting up and heading into his cage to put on his armor and swords.

"Simple enough," the mage said. "You could probably use a mount, too," and went off to fetch things.

Aiden had to sneak past the staff in the main section of the manor to get to the stable, but it wasn't exactly difficult to do so. He was pretty sure the mage's servants were experts at staying out of the man's way. The horse the mage had had readied was a pretty gray mare that Aiden immediately decided to call Mouse. Getting out of the stable and off the estate without being seen was a little more of a challenge, but once he hit the orchard it was dead simple. He pointed Mouse's nose towards the mountains and thought to himself as he rode.

_Let's see… there's that lake up a ways, I can get drowner bits there. And I think there's a section of ruins he hasn't extended into, that should have wraiths._

Nekkers would be simple enough too, and the herbal and other alchemical components he would need were—apart from the arenaria—generally ones the mage kept stocks of, but it wouldn't hurt to gather more if they were available.

He was well-fed and in excellent shape, and drowners and wraiths and nekkers were all pretty standard fights. It only took him two days to get the parts he needed from them, and he also harvested a huge number of flowers and other botanical ingredients. There was a whole alpine meadow that had been covered in arenaria, and Aiden made note of the location for future use. Mouse had been extremely helpful; she had clearly been trained to not panic over the smell of blood. Aiden hoped she’d be the mount the mage sent with him to Toussaint—she was a sweet one and he quite liked her.

He snuck back in without anyone seeing him, leaving Mouse groomed and fed her stall as the stablehand slept in the loft, and headed back into the hidden underground chambers. The mage wasn’t there, but the alchemy kit was set out and ready to be used. Aiden sighed and got to work distilling; no point in putting it off, and the White Gull would need to steep for a while before he could use it.

He had finished all the active parts of decocting and was bottling the oils and potions that were ready to go when the mage walked in.

“Good morning, Gib,” he said. “Have you been up all night?”

Aiden rolled his shoulders and stretched. “I got some meditation while I was making things. I’m fine.” Gods he hated that nickname. The first time the mage had broken it out Aiden had been more than a little concerned that he’d intended to follow up on the meaning, but he was apparently playing a little fast and loose with it.

“As long as you’re certain,” the mage said, cupping his hand around the back of Aiden’s neck. “I procured a couple of corpses from one of the nearer villages and set up a pit trap with them as the bait. I haven't gone too close, obviously, but I can get you there so you can see if it's collected the correct species."

 _A pit trap? Unconventional but probably very, very effective. And definitely very, very brutal. I hope he didn’t have people killed for the bait,_ Aiden thought. Out loud, he said “No time like the present.”

“Well enough,” the mage said, stroking Aiden’s neck a bit before removing his hand. “Let’s go, then.”

* * *

The pit trap was, as expected, brutal. It was probably twelve feet deep and the bottom was filled with large, close-clustered ash-wood spikes. There were six ghouls in the bottom. One, a graveir, was still alive, thrashing weakly as it bled from multiple impalement wounds. Aiden dispatched it with a crossbow bolt. He then tied a rope around a nearby tree and his own waist to rappel down into the pit so he could haul out the graveir and an alghoul that had gotten a spike through the neck. 

“Will those two suffice?” the mage asked.

“Should be enough,” Aiden said, hauling out the second corpse.

The mage nodded and waved a hand and a pile of dirt that must have been excavated from the hole shifted to fill the pit as Aiden started butchering. He filled a flask with blood first and then set to stripping flesh, muscle, and ligament from bone. He had gore up to his elbows by the time he was done, and he knew he had blood and slime over most of the rest of him from hauling the corpses out of the pit. He was going to need another bath.

The bones he bundled up with the rope, and then he gave the rest of the remains a concentrated blast of Igni to get them burning.

The mage walked over. "I believe you actually have blood in your hair," he said, brushing a lock of it aside.

Aiden hummed and inclined his head, picking up the bones.

"Unfortunately we're not near a water source," the mage continued, "or I would let you rinse off there."

Aiden shrugged his shoulder. Wasn't the first time, wouldn't be the last, honestly.

“Ah, stoicism,” the mage said with a smile, and opened a portal back to his manor.

* * *

Aiden had gotten a bath and breakfast and was getting started on the extended process of refining quebrith from the bones when the mage came back in.

“Ah, excellent. There’s actually an opportunity I wanted to speak with you about,” he said.

Aiden glanced up.

“I’m going to need a golem’s heart, but I’ve specialized in… other areas,” the mage continued. “There’s a colleague of mine who would welcome an opportunity to try and humiliate me with a bet; a golem of his versus a champion of mine.”

That the mage would put him on display like that— Aiden frowned.

“Oh, I would tell him I’d hired you— he’s made more than a few supercilious comments about how my research and interest in your lot’s abilities is an unnecessarily restrictive view in comparison to the powers a mage can muster on their own,” the mage said, accurately reading the frown. “However, I want to be sure that you’re prepared before I contact him with the challenge.”

Aiden considered for a minute. "If you can get me an endrega embryo, maybe some arachas venom, and a couple of days to practice, I should be able to handle it."

The mage smiled. "Simple enough, then. I have the components on hand, in fact; I'll fetch them and then go arrange for the match. Will five days do?"

Aiden nodded.

"Excellent," the mage said. "And, for the duration, feel free to roam the estate. It'll lend credence to my having hired you for this little contest. I’ll have a room set aside."

Aiden was debating the pros and cons of continually being under the compulsion spells layered on him or having to sleep in the cage, and hadn’t reached a conclusion by the time the mage came back with a jar containing an embryonic endrega and a vial with the venom. He took them and started making some Thunderbolt and Tawny Owl, while the mage worked on something else beside him.

Once he finished all the active parts of those concoctions, he left them steeping and snuck out to one of the courtyards to practice the moves and Signs he would use against a golem. A couple hours later, he noticed one of the servants had come out and left him a basket of food, and he ended his simulated fight for lunch. The food contained a much higher proportion of servant leftovers than he usually got, but it all still tasted fine. He did wonder, a little guiltily, if he was depriving any of the servants, but he doubted that the mage would let him get away with eating less over the days before a big fight.

He took a few moments after he finished to enjoy being outside without any particular tasks to accomplish before getting back up and casting another Yrden, holding onto it to make it damaging and not just slowing.

The sun was setting when another servant came out and stood, radiating nervousness, by the edge of the courtyard. When Aiden paused, she said, “Master Witcher, my master requests your presence for dinner.”

Aiden closed his eyes for a moment in lieu of rolling them. “Of course,” he said. “I’ll be right there.”

“I’m to show you to your rooms as well, so you can freshen up,” she said, shifting her weight slightly. Aiden smiled through the waft of sour fear coming from her and stayed a couple meters behind her as she led him though the manor to a guest suite. Aiden washed off most of the sweat and put on the clothes that had been laid out, which fit him perfectly well—they were nicer than most of the ones provided to him, but he would bet they were from the same source.

Once he was dressed, he followed the scared woman to the dining hall. He hadn't been in it before, and he had to stop and blink at the huge room. He knew that the mage owned at least one mine in Kovir and so was stupidly rich—hell, he had a manor house built on top of elven ruins—but something about this massive space, dedicated to what appeared to be _one person_ , really struck home.

 _I can't picture him entertaining,_ Aiden thought.

The mage was already present, sitting at the head table. He gestured to the seat at his left side, and Aiden dug his nails into his palms to keep from reacting sarcastically while walking up and taking a seat.

Supper progressed roughly as Aiden would have imagined—uncomfortable, unpleasant, and unsettling. The mage managed to keep his hands off Aiden’s face, but the additional finesse involved in not letting on to the mage’s servants that Aiden was the mage’s pet project, as it were, ate up most of the relief. There wasn’t anything particularly special about the food, which was mildly unsettling as well.

Afterwards, while Aiden was settling into the guest bed, he still wasn’t sure if the situation was better or worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one part horror, one part mild wealth porn.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thank you to laurelnose, who provided a delightful snappy comeback which I used here, and who also told me what the right School was for the replacement medallion.

Things continued in more or less that vein until the other mage arrived. The morning of the day that he was supposed to arrive, Aiden was in the rooms lent to him, checking over his potions, when the mage walked in.

"I have something for you, Aiden," he said.

Aiden looked up cautiously, and just— stopped. The mage was holding out a Witcher medallion. A _Wolf school_ Witcher medallion. He—

“You require a medallion for the part, so I procured this one for you. It’s not your school, but I tested it, and it reacts to magic and monsters.”

He couldn’t. He _couldn’t_ let the mage— 

He held out his hand, and the mage dropped the medallion into it.

“Silas should be here before noon,” the mage said. “And he’s going to be staying to supper, but I’ll be able to kick him out after that, so we'll only have to deal with him for twelve hours or so.”

Aiden nodded, barely hearing him.

The Wolf medallion buzzed in his hand.

“Oh, the damn bastard,” the mage said, clearly annoyed. “I’ll go deal with him. Come along to the breezeway surrounding the main courtyard whenever you’re ready. Don’t go into the courtyard itself.”

Once the mage walked out of the room, Aiden closed his hand over the medallion and pulled it and his head in towards his chest. He couldn’t smell anyone but the mage on the metal, even when he forced himself to take deep, long breaths with his mouth open.

It didn’t have to mean anything. It didn’t have to be his. There were plenty of people who collected bits of Witcher gear, and Wolves had been dying on the Path since the school had started. _It wasn’t Lambert’s medallion._

Rather than sit there repeating that statement until he thought he could believe it, he slipped the chain of the medallion over his head and slumped into a kneeling posture. He would meditate, and he would put the idea that Lambert could be dead for all he knew aside, and then he would get up and go kill a golem.

* * *

Aiden had developed several new _categories_ of disliking mages, but this one still managed to invoke a kind of petty annoyance that caused a great deal more surface-level friction than the mage who was literally keeping him like a pet. Aiden wasn’t sure if that was a bad sign or not.

Still, how was he _supposed_ to feel when the other mage—Silas—had looked at him when he walked into sight along the breezeway, sneered, and said “I’ve heard a Skelliger saying that scars are a sign of not knowing when to duck”?

At least the sudden surge of annoyance was a good distraction.

Aiden grinned, showing off all his teeth, and said "I could always grab my steel and we could figure out which one of us knows how to duck."

Silas looked like a domestic cat had started shit-talking him. Aiden just kept smiling.

"I am _not_ here to engage in a physical confrontation with you," the man said haughtily, once he’d recovered.

He had the nerve to look as if he’d scored some sort of point.

"Really? So tall, dark, and rocky over there is just a new bit of statuary, then?" Aiden asked, tilting his head towards the motionless figure of the golem, kneeling in the center of the courtyard.

Silas actually spluttered. 

_He can’t possibly be this bad at this,_ Aiden thought, slightly incredulously, glancing at the mage out of the corner of his eye. The man was biting at his lip to try to hide a smile.

“My golem is unparalleled in its strength,” Silas snapped. “It will have no trouble defeating you!”

“Perhaps you’d care for a small wager, then?” the mage asked. “Since you’re so certain you’ll be successful.”

Silas seemed to realize something was up, but he’d pretty thoroughly backed himself into a corner with that last statement. “Very well then, Artorius. What will you be offering me when I win?”

“I believe I could provide a small chest of my mine’s profits,” _Artorius_ —he’d never known the mage’s name—said lazily.

“Agreed,” snapped Silas, an avaricious light in his eye.

“Ah, but if I win, I want your xenovox,” Artorius finished.

Silas inhaled sharply, but slowly nodded.

“Fight to end by incapacitation or verbal concession, the Witcher is allowed to use all of the tools of his trade, and neither of us to interfere,” Artorius said.

“Yes, yes,” Silas said, waving a hand. “The golem will attack the first person who enters the courtyard. When you’re prepared, Witcher.”

Rather than open potential arguments about timing by obviously prepping before the fight truly began, Aiden walked into the courtyard first, then drew his oiled silver sword while pulling the vials of Thunderbolt and Tawny Owl out of his belt pouch. The golem straightened and began walking towards him, but Aiden had more than enough time to uncork and down the potions. They tasted just as bad as he remembered, but a Witcher with a gag reflex wasn’t, so he just tucked the vials away and cast a damaging Yrden, which immediately zapped the golem.

The golem groaned and recoiled slightly, but took another couple of tromping steps and wound up for a massive swing. Unfortunately for it, Aiden had excellent reflexes, and so had more than enough time to sidestep out of the way and follow up with a couple of heavy blows once it was committed.

The golem reached up to swing its arms heavily into the ground and got zapped again, which gave Aiden the chance to get out of the range of the small shockwave. He neatly leapt back in and hammered on the golem a little more while the Yrden kept working, and dodged a swing of one massive arm. However, Aiden only saw the golem’s torso twist back just before impact as the other arm came around. He didn’t have time to dodge, so he had to throw up a very hasty Quen.

The blow shattered the shield and sent him flying backwards, but he turned the fall into a roll and was back on his feet in no time. Something seemed wrong, though. The potions he'd taken usually caused pain, Tawny Owl as it broke down lactic acid far faster than usual, and Thunderbolt as his muscles pushed beyond normal limits, but—

He blinked, trying to pinpoint the problem, and felt a stab of pain from his left eye.

 _Oh, **fuck,**_ Aiden thought. He slid his right eye closed as the golem started winding up to charge, and his vision went fuzzy and blurred. _Bloody, ploughing **fuck!**_

He threw himself to the side as the golem stomped towards him, then opened his eye and started cutting at the creature with a rather greater sense of urgency. The shooting pain in his left eye came again, and then again, quicker than the last, and Aiden could feel liquid of some kind gathering in the corner. He really, _really_ hoped the eyeball wasn't literally melting.

This fight suddenly had a much tighter time limit. He backed away from another swing and went right back in, casting another Yrden the moment he could. A second swipe from the golem brushed against his armor, jarring his ribs and snapping a buckle, and he grimaced and circled to try and keep it on his right side.

The golem was at least looking a lot more battered than it had when they’d started. He circled around towards its back, aided by another bolt from the Yrden, and started bashing at it as hard as he could. His eye started throbbing in time with the hits, as the stonelike body of the golem sent jarring vibrations up his arms with each blow. A chunk fell off of the main body, and he shifted stances to drive his sword into the crevasse. The golem let out an eerie moan and the medallion vibrated. Aiden, suspecting trouble, threw up a Quen shield. The Yrden sent one last bolt into the creature, and the golem— exploded, to another vibration.

Shards of the rocky body smashed into his shield, and a wave of heat and smoke poured over him. There was a snarled curse from where the mages were standing and a sudden buzz of magic. When the smoke cleared there were bits of golem embedded in the smooth floor of the courtyard and in some of the breezeway pillars.

“Was it _supposed_ to explode?” Artorius asked scathingly. He was holding a shield spell, and from the scattered debris around it, had definitely been in range.

Silas coughed and dismissed a shield of his own. “Unexpected experimental outcomes, Artorius, I’m sure you understand.” He sounded like his teeth were gritted.

 _Bullshit,_ Aiden thought, and winced as another stabbing pain shot through his eye. He dropped his Quen, sheathed his poor battered blade, and tried to surreptitiously wipe beneath his eye as he turned to the side. His fingers came away with reddish-black smears.

“Indeed,” Artorius said, sounding like he believed Silas as much as Aiden did. He dropped his shield after a moment and strode out into the courtyard, over to the largest chunk of golem and, by apparent coincidence, to Aiden.

Aiden’s good eye was tearing up now from the near-constant pain shooting through the other, but he noticed when the mage halted abruptly. The man then made a gesture at the golem remains and then tapped under his own left eye, using his body to block the movements from Silas.

“I would call that fairly definitively defeated, Silas, wouldn’t you?” he then said, nudging the golem with a foot.

“It appears that your Witcher has indeed won the day,” Silas agreed, sounding like he was forcing every word out.

“Excellent,” Artorius said, clapping his hands together. “Shall we break and reconvene in my parlor for a glass of brandy? We could probably all use the chance to freshen up.”

“Of course,” Silas said bitterly. “Would you be so kind as to have a servant point me to my rooms?” 

“Of course, Silas,” Artorius said, and he returned to Silas’ side, whereupon both the men turned and walked away.

Once they were out of sight, Aiden pulled his other potions out of his side pouch and picked out a White Honey. It was possible it would make things worse, but potion toxicity was the only explanation he could think of for the pain radiating through his eye, and if he could just bind and flush the toxins—

It took a minute before he noticed anything, but there was a pause between the stabbing pains, and then another, and Aiden sighed aloud with relief, ignoring a twinge in his side from the deep breath. He blinked away the tears in his right eye and set to removing the heart from the remains of the golem. The heart was shiny and black—it looked like obsidian, a glassy rock that was supposedly common around certain kinds of volcanoes. Definitely different from the other hearts he’d seen in golems in his lifetime. Task complete, he slunk off to the mage’s labs.

He’d placed the heart in the storage room and was sharpening his silver sword more by touch than by sight when the mage came in. He looked up and heard a hiss from the man. Aiden rather resignedly put the sword and whetstone aside as Artorius walked forward.

Sure enough— "I am a _fool_ ," Artorius said, gently prodding at the area around Aiden's left eye.

Aiden had to literally bite his tongue to keep from reacting to that one.

“Curse that idiot as well, he’ll want to be entertained,” the mage muttered. “How impacted is your vision?”

Aiden obediently closed his right eye. “Well, it’s still taking in light,” he said. “But other than that it’s completely shot.”

The mage cursed, quietly, and cast a spell of some sort.

“It doesn’t appear to be degrading any further, at least. Do you know why it’s stopped?”

“I took some White Honey after you and the other mage walked off. The only thing I could think of that might be causing it was the potions.”

“Very good thinking, Gib. Are you still in pain?”

“Not in the same way, but yes,” Aiden said. “I was getting shooting pains when it was actively degrading, but now there’s an ache and a sensation like there’s sand in there.”

“I should be able to keep you from feeling that, for the short term,” Artorius said. “Hold still for just a moment.”

The medallion buzzed again, and the awful grating pain in his eye abated, leaving him feeling a little light-headed. He took a deep, relieved breath and blinked when his side didn’t protest.

_Going to have to be careful about this, then._

“Now I haven’t fixed anything—I don’t have time to, unfortunately—so be careful to not do yourself any further damage while you won’t be able to feel it,” the mage said, echoing Aiden’s thoughts. “If we clean you up a bit I believe it’ll pass muster, and I’ll make your excuses for missing drinking in the parlor.”

Not having to sit and listen to the two mages being poisonously polite at each other was a relief at least, though Aiden had to keep a carefully neutral expression as the mage wiped his face off with a damp cloth.

“And that’s as long a delay as I can afford,” the mage said after a minute. “There will be a bath and clothing in your rooms for when you’re finished with your arms and armor. I’ll send someone to fetch you for supper.”

Aiden nodded ( _like a good little pet_ ) and took up the sword and whetstone again, despite wanting to go into the mage’s storeroom and smash everything in there and then set it all on fire.

He excised most of the feeling by honing the silver sword to razor sharpness again and painstakingly stitching the snapped buckle on his armor back together. His depth perception wasn’t off by too much, but he had to be careful not to compress his ribs too badly.

Once he was finished, he headed back up to the guest quarters for that bath. It was simple enough to reheat the water, and he carefully washed, being gentle around the bruise blooming on his side. The clothes provided were well-made but sturdy; more like what a traveling Witcher would have on hand than what he’d been wearing the past few days. He pulled them on and slid into a kneeling position—he would meditate until the servant came to call him to the meal.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are two parts to this chapter; wealth porn and mild body horror. Warnings again for eye trauma, although this isn't too in-depth.
> 
> (Also yes, the slipfish thing is from Astolat’s fic Misethere.)

Aiden still wasn’t feeling any pain when a young woman knocked on the door and announced that dinner was being served. 

It turned out that wasn’t _quite_ accurate; there was food, but it was clear that Artorius was serving in tradition of some of the rich assholes who thought the ‘usual’ seven courses wasn’t _showing off enough_. Instead of being served a single appetizer, they offered a selection of the damn things before moving into the main meal. The theme for this one appeared to be seafood and expensive citrus; Aiden saw crabmeat, pickled cockles, oysters baked with a very green purée, scallops wrapped with common bacon, and, of course, caviar, nearly all accompanied with wedges of lemons or limes. 

One of the platters even contained an arrangement of slipfish and citrus, which _must_ have been portaled in—he couldn’t smell anything off about it in the slightest. Aiden couldn’t help a tiny smile, thinking of how Lambert would react to this particular dish. Admittedly, he’d never seen Lambert actually _turn down_ any kind of food, but he would almost certainly complain about being expected to think of raw fish as a delicacy.

“Oh, that’s—” Silas started, loftily superior, conveniently cutting off Aiden’s train of thought.

“Slipfish. Metinnan delicacy,” Aiden said, deftly claiming the serving utensils and transferring a large helping of the fish to his plate, then pouring some of the delicate chilled Metinnan white into his goblet to accompany it. He personally preferred to eat slipfish like a savage most of the time, by adding chili oil, but the mage didn’t need to know that.

Aiden heard the tiniest huff of laughter and glanced up under the pretense of offering the serving dish to Silas in time to catch Artorius hiding his expression in his goblet.

"I imagine you've traveled to Metinna, then," Artorius said as he put the goblet down.

“I’ve been all over,” Aiden said, and took a mouthful so he wouldn’t have to elaborate. 

The citrus on the platter was decorative; the fish had already been seasoned. Admittedly, it was quite good; the fish had just enough fat, and whoever had done the seasoning hadn’t overdone it to where it would ruin the wine.

For once, Aiden lucked out—the mages began discussing acquaintances of theirs in different locations instead of talking to him. He knew why they were doing it, but it let him eat in peace, instead of having to make conversation. Everything was very tasty, and Aiden wondered if Artorius’ cooks were this good at this variety of foods or if he’d portaled in completed dishes from some big-city cooks somewhere.

Far too many minutes in, after Aiden had made serious inroads into everything on offer and the mages had at least tasted everything, a number of servants appeared to take away the platters and the used plates and cutlery. Aiden resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the look Silas gave him as the appetizer platters were removed. Artorius knew, far too intimately, what Witcher metabolic capacity was, and had absolutely calculated the first ‘course’ to make up for human-sized portions later. It would also probably unnerve Silas, but Aiden resented getting Artorius’ help on that.

The soup at least was green borscht, but the size of the hardboiled eggs in it revealed them to be from some draconid or another.

 _Wyvern_ , Aiden thought, chewing on a quarter. There was a texture difference you got used to when you were eating monster bits for survival instead of for snobbery, and this was almost falling apart in his mouth. He came within half a step of snorting into the wine they were serving with it as Silas rather begrudgingly complimented them as a method of elevating the dish, but telling the idiot that he could eat these for only a few hours’ work would be more likely to make the man sneer than anything else.

After that it was a very small hen apiece covered with an orange glaze paired with another white wine, then herbed pink lamb with a light red, and then a heavily alcoholic sorbet without an accompaniment. Aiden realized Artorius was cheating a bit when he served a salad with a pâté that had slivers of truffle in it that was paired with a heavier, earthier red, and almost smirked at him across the table before he remembered his situation. 

Silas must be from somewhere near Toussaint; the progression through wines as food pairings was something that the Toussaintois would appreciate, and Silas being subject to and completely missing it was an insult all on its own, even lacking anyone but his host and a Witcher to witness his embarrassment. The mage in question was too busy giving Aiden an ever-so-slightly confused look across the table as Aiden finished the salad and a second glass of the wine to notice he was missing out on something else, which Aiden did feel mildly smug over. 

They were given a whole selection of cheeses, all of which went extremely well with the very dry and strong red wine served with the course. Aiden saved the goat cheese with peppercorns in it for last, savoring the mild bite along with the tart cheese. 

He drained his goblet and sighed with contentment that was only slightly feigned. 

“Should I hope for a dessert, or was the cheese the last?” he asked. “If it was, I would love another glass, of this,” he gestured with the goblet, “Or if I could make good on the brandy I missed.”

Artorius was definitely smirking, a tiny little thing that grew wider as Silas’ eyes widened just enough to notice.

“Dessert and an additional digestif are both on the menu for the evening, Witcher,” he said. Aiden ruthlessly killed a shudder at how his vocation sounded in Artorius’ mouth.

It actually took until the fortified wine was poured with the bittersweet chocolate dessert—fucking _chocolate_ , that was rare as hell—for Silas to realize that he had completely missed his chance to comment on the progression of wines. The rictus grin that plastered itself on his face was actually downright amusing. Silas left as soon as he was able after that, professing his thanks for the match and the supper through gritted teeth. 

When the portal had closed behind him, Artorius actually broke out in laughter.

“Outclassed by a Witcher, in multiple quarters,” he said a moment later, still snickering. “Oh, I’ll be able to hold that over his head until you kill him.”

 _That_ sent a boulder crashing down on Aiden. Artorius glanced at him and frowned slightly.

“Is your eye bothering you again?” he asked.

“Not exactly,” Aiden said.

Artorius sighed and reached for Aiden’s chin, tilting his head so he could look into the eye.

“It’s not exactly ideal, but I need you to wait until tomorrow,” he said. “I’m afraid I’ve overindulged this evening, and I shouldn’t be working on that while tipsy.”

Aiden swallowed, shoving a number of images out of his head. “Understandable,” he said.

The mage let go and patted his cheek a bit. “Now, would you like that brandy?”

Aiden shrugged a shoulder. “Can’t say I would turn it down.”

Back in his cage with a large glass of śliwowica and all of the compulsion spells off of him for the first time in days, Aiden curled in on himself, clutching the wolf’s-head medallion in one hand and knotting the other into his newly-trimmed hair.

* * *

The next morning, he had to brush some dried blood off the hand he’d been holding the medallion with. He made a face, but at least he didn’t seem to have ripped out any of his hair. That would have been hard to explain.

His eye socket felt like it was full of sand again, and he downed the śliwowica in one long burning gulp in the hopes that the sudden rush from the alcohol would dull the rasping sensation. It did fade a little, after several minutes, but not enough that he’d be using booze to self-medicate if the situation continued for much longer.

He should probably get up and do something. Read a book, at least. But the knowledge of _another_ eye transplant, another assassination— more _mutations—_

He lay back down and curled up again.

A little while later, he heard Artorius walking in.

“Aiden? Are you all right?”

Aiden turned over to look at the mage. He wasn’t looking too worse for the wear despite yesterday’s supposed overindulgence. He even had a basket in hand full of food for Aiden, as he did most mornings. This morning it looked all like food that could be eaten cold. Well, that was to be expected.

“Spell wore off overnight,” Aiden said, rather than make the mage force the answer out of him.

The mage’s expression softened further. “That would do it. I’ll remove that one today and we can give you some time to heal while I grow the new batch. I’d also prefer to test them against your potions while they’re not in your head, so I’ll need a little more information on that. Nothing too stressful, I just need to magically observe a few things in your right eye while you’re under the influence of the potions.”

Aiden was not particularly interested in experiencing what he had yesterday again anytime soon, so that was a minor boon at least.

“Do they need to be the same ones?” he asked.

The mage pulled a face. “I think we’ll have you take one at a time, unless you can think of any unique interactions that different mixes have.”

“They generally don’t interact with each other, at least not in ways other than increasing the toxicity we have to deal with. Creators likely accounted for that on purpose.”

“Well, that’s a time-saver, at least,” Artorius said, with a slight twist to his mouth. “Do you have enough of the other ingredients to replenish your potions afterwards?”

“Everything except the arachas venom and endrega embryo,” Aiden said.

“I’ll see if I can acquire some additional ones,” Artorius said. “Now, let’s get this done before you eat.”

Aiden felt the medallion buzz as the spells settled on him, and he stood up and removed his shirt so as to not risk it getting stained while the mage was working. The mage opened the cages, and Aiden walked out and into the surgical room and started cleaning and sterilizing the table while the mage did the equipment and himself. When he was done, he lay down on the cool surface and waited for the mage to insert the IV. Once that was in and working, he’d gotten the hang of mostly just drifting, only keeping an ear out in case the mage asked him any questions.

He’d experimented with keeping his right eye open or shut during the process; he still wasn’t sure which he preferred. Constantly seeing surgical tools going for his face and the mage having to stop every so often to drip saline in his eye wasn’t exactly _pleasant_ , but neither was the wave of panic when his vision cut off completely, compounded by his inability to take faster or deeper breaths in response. He might have actually passed out the first time he’d tried it, though he wasn’t certain. This time, though, the left eye was so damaged that he decided to go for closed. He wouldn’t be suddenly losing anything other than a big light blur.

Even so, he would have flinched if he could have when everything went black on that side.

“Not too much longer,” the mage said softly.

Aiden’s stomach lurched in an echo of nausea. Every time the mage read him accurately he had to wonder if someday he would figure out just how much Aiden hated him—if Aiden might lose that chance that he had to kill the man and escape.

Aiden heard the current tool being set down, and another being picked up. He was almost pathetically glad he couldn’t feel anything, despite the boon only existing because of the torturous death of a man he’d known and mentored, even if he’d become a killer-for-hire.

“You were glorious fighting that golem, you know,” Artorius murmured. “I didn’t get to tell you last night. People think you’re just dull brutes, hacking at a monster until it falls, but that’s not it at all. You’re smart, and quick, and you prepare extensively before you walk into a fight. Would that more people were like that.”

Aiden seriously doubted that the mage would actually enjoy a world full of people who thought critically. He enjoyed feeling superior to his enemies far too much for that.

The mage fell silent for a minute; he was probably doing something fiddly.

“There we go,” he said at last. “You’re likely to still be a little sore for a while, so I won’t give you anything to hold the shape for now. Let me get you bandaged, and I’ll get you an analgesic as well.”

Aiden lay there, listening to the mage moving around. At some point he adjusted the drip Aiden was on and feeling started coming back; his left socket hurt like hell, although at least the mage hadn’t needed to cut through the bone this time. The man poured a dose of painkiller into his mouth and made sure he swallowed, and waited several minutes before he cut off the anesthetic completely.

Aiden blinked his eye open, feeling more than a little fuzzy.

The mage smiled at him and ran a hand through his hair. “Poor Gib. Food should help with that.”

Aiden might have clenched his jaw a bit at that, but he let it pass, like he always did.

“Would you be so good as to label your potions for me after you’ve eaten, just so that I don’t have to ask you which is which while I’m busy testing?” the mage said, continuing his stroking.

“Mm,” Aiden managed, in the affirmative. He didn’t really want to lie here having his hair _petted_ , but he also didn’t want to just fall over when he tried to get up.

Eventually the anesthetic mostly wore off, and Aiden made to sit up. The mage stopped petting him and handed him the bottle of the painkiller, and withdrew with the tray of surgical tools to clean them. Aiden just stepped haltingly out into the main room, collected the basket of food, and collapsed on his bed. He could assemble a sandwich lying down. It was fine. It was _fine_.

He fell back asleep after managing several bites. He was pretty sure the food made it back to the bedside table, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So: Artorius was serving a seven course meal that progresses from very light white wines to heavy red ones, and since salad 'should' come after the entree he's cheating a little by adding something to the salad that will allow a heavier red wine. Yes, this is pure and ridiculous snobbery. Yes, I had fun writing it.
> 
> Also, I know that technically isn’t how anesthetic works (or even how really strong painkillers work), but Witchers are stupidly resistant to various drugs so I’m making shit up as I go along.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I owe Laurelnose thanks once again, for helping me improve a bit of dialogue that was verging on incredibly boring and for 'how Lambert deals with stitches'.

Healing was pretty standard. He woke when the pain in his socket spiked again, had more of the painkiller and more food, and used the excuse to go back to sleep. The next day, he’d still felt pretty shit in general, but he’d gotten up and started through sword forms because he needed to keep in shape. He’d opened one of the new books that afternoon too, but had only gotten a little ways in before putting it down in guilt.

It was roughly a month before the mage had something that would work, which was almost ridiculously quick. The man only took a week observing Aiden’s right eye after he’d taken his potions, and then had disappeared into his lab with a second batch of everything that Aiden had made up, for eye-testing purposes.

“It’s not perfect, of course, and I _still_ don’t know what’s causing the color difference, but Moreau’s notes have been _so_ valuable,” the mage said as he was installing it in Aiden’s head. “The scholar didn’t have all of them, but he had the most relevant ones to really making changes to Witchers.”

Aiden was just glad he couldn’t flinch.

Artorius had to use an actual spell to _connect_ the bit of optic nerve on the eye to the most of one that was still in Aiden’s head, so Aiden’s vision didn’t come back until Artorius had actually put all the bits of his skull back in place and made a neat line of sutures sealing the cuts he’d had to make. Probably for the better, all told.

Everything started off much too bright, but thankfully he could constrict the new pupil to where he wasn’t being blinded. Colors all looked fine and his vision wasn’t noticeably fuzzy, which was a blessing—being halfway fucked up on seeing colors hadn’t been the worst experience he’d ever had, but having to basically go right back to the operating table hadn’t been what he would call pleasant.

Artorius went through the rigamarole of taking him off the anesthetic slowly, but instead of the usual dose of painkillers that he insisted on Aiden taking, he changed things up a bit.

“I know you’re probably in quite a bit of pain, but do you think you could get through some vision tests right now?” the mage asked.

Aiden wasn’t sure he was up to speaking, but he let his confusion show on his face.

“If the eye is up to general standards, we could further test its reaction to potion toxicity and get you healed quicker, rather than waiting another two weeks,” the mage explained.

Aiden considered that for a minute. He’d be approaching the prospect of additional mutations quicker, but he also wouldn’t have to wait out the horrible itching sensation of part of his skull growing back together, and he would be out of the mage’s immediate reach for _days_ , maybe even _weeks_ while in Toussaint.

“Think I c’n,” he managed.

The mage smiled down at him and started _petting_ him again, damn it all.

“Well then, we’ll see how it goes. Any noticeable defects?”

“No,” Aiden said, truthfully.

“Excellent. Now—” the mage made a gesture and nearly all the lights went out.

Aiden dilated the pupil in his left eye, keeping his right closed for the moment. Everything seemed about normal, but he switched which eye was open for comparison. There was an awful burning sensation where the mage had been cutting, and every time he blinked he could tell where the sutures near the edge of his eyelid were, but it wasn't as if he wasn't used to pain.

“Normal,” he said.

“Good. Up to walk over to the testing chair?” the mage asked.

Aiden had to lock his knees to start, but managed to stay upright without assistance. The walk into the room with all the various lenses and tools the mage used to test his eyesight more thoroughly was more than a little precarious, but he did well enough that the mage didn’t actually grab his elbow or waist. Sinking into the chair was a relief, though.

The mage got started with a minimum of fuss, and at least he got all of the tests that involved touching Aiden’s face out of the way first.

“Looks healthy for now,” Artorius said, putting away the light he’d been shining directly into the eye. “We’re going to have to do that again after you take the potion, but with a little luck we won’t have any problems.”

Aiden stifled a groan and blinked to clear the spots so he could focus on the next round of tests. It took Artorius another half-hour before he was satisfied, but he eventually declared the eye good enough for Aiden to try a healing potion. He went out to collect it, the tools to remove stitches, and the White Honey just in case it went wrong again.

Aiden downed the Rafford's that Artorius brought in and made a face as the awful itching, stinging sensation of flesh and bone knitting at maximum speed set in around his eye socket.

"Are you all right?" the mage asked.

"Fine," Aiden said. "Just not very pleasant. Have the stitches grown over?"

Artorius leaned in and ran his thumb over Aiden’s temple. “A little bit,” he said. “I take it that’s common?”

“Common enough,” Aiden confirmed. It really was, actually. Being too busy to check on them, having to take a potion—he’d had to dig out his fair share of buried thread over his time as a Witcher.

“Well, they’ve clearly outlived their usefulness,” the mage said. “Lie back in the chair.”

Aiden did as instructed, and the mage set about cleaning Aiden’s face and the tools.

“Tell me immediately if you feel anything from the eye,” he instructed before he actually began.

Having stitches removed was always an odd sensation, and it verged into mildly unpleasant for ones that had grown over. He and Lambert had done it for each other all the damn time when they were traveling together—the dumbass tended to take stitches out when they inconvenienced him, which meant about half the time Aiden would find out he'd taken them out _early_ when something opened up the wound again, and the other half of the time he'd find half-buried stitches that Lambert had just kind of forgotten about.

Aiden had tried not to bug him too much about it when he missed the chance to get him to keep them in for the right amount of time; Lambert wasn't _usually_ outright self-destructive while he was being spiteful, but there’d been an incident with a really condescending healer that Aiden had never gotten to hear details about that had nevertheless made him feel like poking at it too hard would do more harm than help.

Aiden blinked as one of the threads pulled a little too hard. It didn’t really hurt, as such, but it jolted him out of his thoughts.

Artorius had finished, it turned out, and he wiped at Aiden’s temple with a bit of gauze. “Would you feel prepared to take a second potion, to test a higher level of toxicity?”

Aiden nodded. He didn’t particularly want to have the eye go wrong during the middle of a fight again either.

* * *

“Well, I’m not seeing any signs of damage,” Artorius said after another full round of testing. “Of course, there could be microtears or similar, but that’s not as much of a concern now.”

Aiden kept his expression neutral. The mage had a little smirk on his face, which meant that probably he had something planned. Aiden just hoped it wasn’t going to be too intrusive.

“I’ll get your supplies together,” Artorius said. “Another day to make sure everything’s working as it should, and then we can really get started.”

The awful light was back in the mage’s eyes.

“I should check over my things,” Aiden said, quietly desperate to get away.

“Of course,” the mage said, running the back of his hand down the side of Aiden’s cheek. “Don’t forget to get some rest.”

Aiden left as quickly as he dared. He collected the finished set of potions, bombs, and sword oils that he would be taking with him, setting aside a few to put into his belt pouch where he could grab them quickly. The armor was next; he checked straps and looked for weak spots or tears of any kind, and patched them if he found them. As he was going over the gauntlets, he slid the couple of knives that did double duty as armor reinforcement out of their places and made sure they were sharp and easy to draw.

Those provided a simple transition into the rest of his blades; the thumb daggers, the hunting knife, his eating knife, several other mid-size flat knives, some silver and some not, and a regular silver dagger on his belt all got sharpened and checked over before he moved on to the swords. Those, Aiden worked on for over an hour, making sure they were razor sharp and oiled, that the hilt wrappings weren’t about to give way, that they slid easily in and out of the sheaths. The sheaths themselves had the straps and buckles tested.

When he was almost finished, the mage came in and locked the cage doors and removed the compulsion spells, which jolted Aiden right back into awareness of his situation as the medallion buzzed. Instead of trying to sleep after that, he slid into a kneeling position and began meditating.

* * *

“Good morning, Gib,” the mage said the next day. “Any issues with the new eye?”

Aiden shook his head. He’d slid out of meditation an hour or so ago and had gotten into his armor and strapped on all his equipment. The things he wasn’t carrying were in their places in a purse designed to hold the glass vials without breakage.

“Good to hear,” the mage said, and settled the spells on Aiden before letting him out to eat breakfast.

While Aiden ate, the mage did a couple of magical tests. Aiden maybe chewed a little more thoroughly than he usually did as the wolf medallion vibrated away against his armor.

“Your horse is waiting. Same mare as last time, since you didn’t express any objections to her,” the mage said once Aiden had finished. “Shall we?”

Aiden loaded his supplies into the saddlebags and picked them and the satchel up, ready to follow Artorius out.

“In the interest of taking two birds with one stone, I’ll be transporting you to the town just outside Silas’ manor,” Artorius said with a small, nasty smile as they were heading through the passageways back to the manor.

Aiden felt like he’d been stabbed with a piece of ice. He didn’t _like_ the other mage after that bit of attempted murder, but he _hated_ being used as an assassin.

“You are to kill Silas. I plan to make use of his home as the drop point for the ingredients I need you to collect, so you will use Axii on the majordomo, to convince him that Silas is conducting some experiment that will require him to remain in seclusion for quite some time. He will, of course, continue to run the household and deflect people attempting to contact Silas. You will also convince him that you’re there to help Silas in some capacity, which will allow you to drop off components regularly,” Artorius said. 

Aiden nodded, face placid despite the way his limbs felt a little bit numb. The day he’d had to tell the mage about Axii was the day he’d also been asked what he was thinking about just in time to tell the mage _precisely_ how much he wanted to kill him, and he couldn’t risk the man finding out he still felt exactly the same way.

“I’ve included a map of his home and what I know of his traps and defenses in his workshop—though you _did_ destroy his best golem, and I don’t believe he’s capable of having created another nearly as fearsome in the time since. I also created a spell that should overwrite his defenses with my own once he’s dead; it will make his tower nearly as safe for you as you are here, Gib,” the mage continued, brushing his fingers over Aiden’s jaw.

Aiden forced himself not to flinch away from the touch, letting his eyes slide closed like he was _pleased_ with it. They stood there for a moment by the hidden entrance into the manor, before Artorius sighed slightly and continued walking, out to the stables. Aiden trailed after like a ghost—

 _Or like a cat,_ he thought grimly.

His spirits rose slightly when they reached the stables and Mouse stretched out her neck to nose his chest, nickering quietly. He gave her a few strokes and loaded the saddlebags and satchel onto her, then took her reins and nodded to the mage.

“Do your school proud, Aiden,” Artorius said as Aiden walked through the portal.

Aiden tightened his grip on the leather and let the momentary disorientation of the in-between space of the portal wash over him. He had to close his eyes momentarily against the sun beating down from above as he emerged at the other end. His nose still worked, though, and he caught sun-dried grass, lavender, rosemary, and grape vines, and he could hear insects calling. When he opened his eyes again, it was to wide fields of vines and grain starting to go gold in the summer sun.

 _Toussaint. Beautiful as ever,_ Aiden thought, looking around until he spotted a large manor house that almost certainly belonged to Silas. _Time to go kill a man._


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guess who didn't sleep _at all_ last night?

It wasn’t as simple as just walking in and stabbing Silas, of course. Killing mages never was.

Aiden found a hiding place a good ways away from the manor, far enough outside of the fields and the town that it was highly unlikely anyone would stumble across it. Once he and Mouse were out of sight, he pulled out the map and additional information Artorius had given him. He took one look at the precautions Artorius _had_ seen on Silas’ tower and immediately flipped over to the bedroom instead, which people other than the mage presumably entered sometimes. There was quite a bit less detail on that than on the tower, but Aiden was fairly sure that it would have less wards and magical traps. 

Aiden memorized the map of the manor, then unsaddled and unloaded Mouse and staked her on a line that would let her graze. He had another look in the satchel the mage had packed after he was through—he thought he’d seen a spyglass in it, which turned out to be correct. 

_Rich people,_ Aiden thought, pulling it and a waterskin out and slowly starting to move towards the manor, keeping low to the ground.

He eventually found a spot that gave him a vantage point into the bedroom windows, though it took him a couple of hours to find the right angle and enough cover. He’d noted earlier that the manor was large, but it was only maybe two-thirds the size of Artorius’ and didn’t sprawl nearly as much—though that might have been to make more space for grape vines.

Once he was in his spot, he made sure the spyglass was shaded so that nobody would catch a glint of glass or metal and came out to investigate, and made sure he and his armor would blend in enough among the colors of his surroundings so that even if someone did catch a glimpse they wouldn’t identify him as a _person_. Then he settled in for a very long watch.

Aiden had kept an eye on the patterns of people moving around the other parts of the manor he could see as late morning turned into afternoon, but there wasn’t any action in the bedroom until evening fell. Right around when the workers dispersed to head back to their homes and the servants filed into the manor, the door Aiden could just see through the glass swung open and a maid stepped in with a tray. Aiden made sure to fix her face in his mind—he would need to talk to her about spells on Silas' rooms. She looked around a bit before moving just out of his view, and stepped back into it without the tray, then circled the room lighting lamps before moving to the north end of the room to do something else.

 _Table or desk in the south corner, bed in the north, most likely,_ Aiden thought. 

Aiden continued observing after she left, taking advantage of the lack of movement to have a drink. He wanted to know what Silas’ routine was—and, failing the ability to watch him for several days, he needed to have at least an _idea_ of what he did in the evenings. 

It was easily another hour before Silas entered the room, and another three past that when the mage finally extinguished the lamps and drew the curtains. Aiden waited one more hour, then took advantage of the complete lack of visible activity going on at the manor to stretch in tiny increments, wincing slightly as his stiff muscles loudly protested. Once he could move without collapsing, he took a quick break before getting back into position.

The manor was quiet until dawn, when the field workers began showing up again and activity started up near the stables and the kitchens. Aiden stayed where he was until Silas drew back the curtains on his bedroom windows, in what looked to be a dressing gown. That would have to be enough, for now. He returned to Mouse and planned his approach while grooming her and telling her what a good horse she was, waiting all day for him.

Aiden dug through his bags and pulled out the supplies he would need. Lockpicks, greasepaint to dull the shine of metal, the token that Artorius had said would overwrite the spells once Silas was dead, and several cloths. He also swapped in dimeritium and samum bombs, along with Hanged Man’s Venom and a Thunderbolt, just in case things went horribly wrong and he had to fight his way out. He wished he had a Blizzard potion, but he preferred that Artorius have extra bits of the golem’s heart to use in testing to make sure whatever he was going to do wasn’t going to kill Aiden, rather than waste them testing what an obsidian golem heart would do to change one of Aiden’s potions.

Supplies packed, he ate some dried meat, cheese, and bread, and sat down to meditate until evening.

* * *

Scaling the side of the manor was definitely more difficult than some of the walls he'd climbed recently, but with the help of a corner and a couple of window sills, he made it up to one of the small and infrequent attic windows.

Peering in through a small gap in the shutters, he confirmed it was a tiny bedroom for a couple of the servants—unfortunately, the maid who'd gone into Silas' bedroom wasn’t in it. He made a face and pulled himself onto the roof so he could access the other windows.

Aiden found the maid at the fourth window. He gently unbarred the shutters and jimmied the window open with one of his flat-bladed knives, then contorted himself to squeeze through without scraping anything on the sill. 

Once he was in, he shut and locked the window and shutters, then cast Axii on the two women sleeping in the tiny room.

"Quietly, now," he said, not quite whispering. "What do you need to get into Silas' bedroom?"

"There's a pendant," said the one he'd seen in the rooms before. "Maude keeps it with the keys."

"And where does Maude sleep?" Aiden asked. 

This time the other woman answered. "With Jean-Paul, most nights. Second floor, west wing, third door down."

With the majordomo, then, unless Aiden missed his guess. That would be useful. 

"Lock the door behind me when I leave. Then go back to sleep and forget this whole encounter," he said, feeding a little more power into his instructions.

The door was pretty well cared-for, and didn't creak as it swung open. Aiden waited until he heard the lock click back into place before he went for the stairs, treading as lightly as he could while still feeling slightly clumsy from the fatigue caused by complex Axii commands. He kept his ears pricked and took deep breaths; if anyone was still awake and wandering the halls, he wanted to know before he ran into them.

He'd chosen the time to approach well—he didn't run into anyone on his way down to the majordomo's room. The door was locked, but it was simple enough that it didn't take more than a minute to pick.

Sure enough, there were two people in the bed together—both slightly older humans who looked like Toussaint natives. Aiden took a deep breath and cast Axii again. He waited until they were sitting up and looking at him to speak.

“Silas will, by the time you begin your duties in the morning, have become involved in a very delicate and time-intensive project and won’t want to be disturbed. He’s hired me to collect components he needs—maybe to show up that Witcher-obsessed mage he was with a month or so ago, to show that a Witcher can be hired by anyone with the coin for it.”

The pair nodded at him, and Aiden licked his lips. He felt drained already, but he just needed to get through this next bit.

"Where are the things necessary to get into Silas' bedroom?" he asked the woman.

"My office. Third floor, next to the stairwell. The key's in my skirt pocket, there," she said, gesturing to a set of neatly folded clothes on a chair. "Only one with the pendant. Just need to be wearing it as you go in."

Drawing on the well of his magic so deeply he could _feel_ himself scraping bottom, Aiden said "Go back to sleep, and forget that you met me like this."

After a long moment, the majordomo and chamberlain lay back down, and Aiden almost sighed in relief. He collected the key and shuffled back upstairs to Maude's office. The pendant was hanging on a hook on the wall, along with another key. Aiden collected both and took a minute to rest and run through the second half of his plan in his head.

_Now the hard part._

* * *

The east wing was devoid of any life but for Silas, which at least made sneaking a little easier. Outside the door to the bedroom, Aiden pulled the pendant on and eased the key into the lock. As it turned, the wolf medallion buzzed a little, and Aiden reached up to keep it from rattling. The door hinges were well-maintained, and didn't make a sound as Aiden eased the heavy door open and slid into the room. Silas was asleep, lying on his back in the bed. Aiden approached, stiletto in hand.

It always felt like something should go wrong when Aiden got to this point—that the mage should awaken and see their killer before the end. Instead, Aiden sank the knife into Silas' brain via his eye and didn't even need to have grabbed the mage's nose and mouth—Silas died without making a sound.

Aiden wanted to stare blankly for a moment, but instead he picked up the body of Artorius' latest rival before any blood could get on the sheets and maneuvered out the door, carefully locking it behind him. Navigating to the tower door while keeping blood from dripping onto the floor was a bit of a challenge, even using a cloth to soak up the dripping blood, but Aiden managed to catch the one drop that escaped with his leg, where it sank into the fabric of his trousers.

Getting out the intricately carved token that would hopefully allow Artorius to overwrite Silas' protection spells took some maneuvering, but Aiden managed it in the end. The medallion started vibrating like mad as he pressed the token to the lock on the tower door, and the wood heated up underneath his fingers. Right when he was wondering if it was going to spontaneously burst into flame, there was a flash of light from the lock and the door swung open.

Aiden gratefully hauled the corpse back into an easier-to-maneuver hold and carried it in, swinging the door shut behind him. The bottom floor of the tower had a half-finished golem slumped in a large pentagram that was etched into the very center of the stone floor, with a couple of feet of space around it. Aiden very carefully did _not_ allow the corpse to brush over the lines or any blood to drip onto or past them as he edged around the room to the stairs.

He was most of the way up the stairs when the medallion buzzed and he heard the sound of a portal opening. He froze, wanting to know who or what it was before he did anything. He couldn’t smell anything over the blood and bits of gore from Silas’ body, but before he could get too twitchy he heard Artorius’ voice.

“Aiden?”

Aiden eased the corpse to the ground and made sure it wasn’t about to slide down the stairs, then carefully crept forward and peered into the second floor. The mage was standing there next to a megascope in a dressing gown hastily thrown over nightclothes. Both were things Aiden had seen the mage wearing before, which lowered the chances of this being some kind of illusion. He straightened a bit and stepped forward, one hand hovering over the hilt of his silver sword and the other holding the gore-coated stiletto, and ready to move at any warning vibration from the medallion.

“Ah, there you are, Gib,” Artorius said warmly. “Where did you stash the body?”

 _Yeah, okay,_ Aiden thought. _Probably him._

“It’s just on the stairs,” Aiden said, carefully putting the knife down on a table and turning back to collect Silas.

He noticed Artorius smirking a bit, probably at the location of the stab wound, but decided not to say anything.

“Here, put him down there,” Artorius said, gesturing to a clear spot. Aiden did and pulled out a scrap of cloth so he could finally mop some of the blood off his hands. Artorius noticed and cast a spell of some kind that dampened the cloth with water. 

“Any trouble with it, Gib?” Artorius asked.

“None yet. I still have a few things to do,” Aiden said.

“I’ll let you do them and get started on preserving that,” with a gesture to Silas’ body, “So that you don’t have to deal with a rotting or burned human corpse and so that we can obscure when he died more effectively.”

Aiden nodded absently and blotted at the drop of blood on his trousers. The coppery smell hanging around him was much fainter than before he’d mopped off his hands and gauntlets, but there was no harm in being cautious.

He quietly descended the tower staircase again, skirted the golem, and headed back up to the chamberlain’s office on the third floor. After he put the key and pendant back exactly the way he’d found them, he returned to the majordomo’s bedroom, returned the office key to Maude’s skirt pocket, and locked the door behind him with his picks.

He got back into the tower just in time to feel a buzz of magic, which had his hand hovering over his sword until he got up to the second floor and saw Silas' body under a magical shield that made it look a bit like it’d been coated in glass.

“Everything is in place?” Artorius asked.

“Yes,” Aiden said, letting himself droop a little. The magical drain wasn’t the hardest thing he’d ever had to work past, but he was tired and sore and he’d just assassinated someone, _again._

“You did a good job, Gib,” Artorius said, briefly cupping his jaw. “Get some rest.”

Aiden didn’t let his jaw clench, didn’t scream over being told he did a _good job_ murdering a man in his bed. He just headed for a little slot between two bookshelves and sat down to meditate for an hour or two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! We're gonna be moving on to more action from here, though I intend to try and maintain those horror vibes.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to Tnico and their fic Denial for giving Aiden a taste for cotignac (which is, incidentally, basically a marmalade made from quinces, and a regional specialty in Cotignac, France). https://archiveofourown.org/works/23722486/chapters/56965693
> 
> And, people who experience vicarious embarrassment, you may want to check the end notes for a description of some events that occur shortly after the scene break.
> 
> EDIT: more art from Laurelnose, thank you so much man!!! https://laurelnose.tumblr.com/post/625651135086231552/was-asked-to-post-this-something-quick-for

Aiden came out of meditation to Artorius cupping the side of his face. It took every single bit of self-control he could muster _not_ to jerk back and give himself a concussion on the wall, and his pupils shot wide without any conscious input on his part.

“Aiden, it’s almost dawn,” the mage said. “I have to get back.”

 _Then why the fuck did you get **me** up?_ Aiden couldn’t help thinking as he adjusted for the light filtering into the tower, but unfortunately sense prevailed. If he was going to sneak out, he’d need to do it before the household got up, and if he was going to get Artorius to portal him out, Artorius needed to know so he could actually make the portal before he left.

“I could use a portal,” Aiden said. He’d prefer not to have to explain what he was doing here if too many people were awake.

“Of course,” the mage said, and waited until Aiden had stretched a bit and made sure everything was where it was supposed to be before opening one.

Aiden walked through it, trying not to look at Silas’ body on the floor past it. The portal deposited him where he’d staked Mouse the previous evening, and apart from a cautious ear-flick, she didn’t react too much to the magic. Rather than think too much, he went over and stroked her a bit, checking to make sure she hadn’t come to any harm overnight. She nuzzled him back and lipped at his chin, which actually startled a bit of a laugh out of him.

“I’m fine, Mouse,” he said quietly, then corrected himself. “I’m not injured.”

He groomed her a little before collecting the tack and saddlebags. He transferred some of the money from the funds Artorius had given him into his belt pouch—a couple of florens, a handful of silver pennies, and a couple of little bits of cheap jewelry that might have been payment from an isolated community, so anyone who stared into his purse while he was paying for something wouldn’t wonder why he was so well-off—and paged through Artorius’ instructions, which was more like a shopping list of monster parts than anything else. Well, mostly monster parts. Aiden frowned in annoyance as he came across a request to order several cases of wine from a number of the wineries spread across the country, and actually bared his teeth when he saw the last line—“three cases of whatever he preferred”, his godsdamn left eye.

Aiden took a couple of deep breaths before starting off towards the village near the manor. He had food in the saddlebags, but it would be worth it to get some breakfast there and spread the lie of his helping Silas with something. It had been a long fucking time since he’d last spoken with someone who wasn’t Artorius.

The village was pretty active as he walked up—workers leaving for the fields, women and kids finishing morning chores. People gave him, and especially the left side of his face, concerned looks, but no one told him to get out. He wandered down the main road, keeping Mouse close to his side, and smiled amiably at anyone who made eye contact. One younger teen actually looked at him in something approaching delight, and he couldn’t keep his smile from sliding into something much more sincere. He slowed outside the largest home in the village. A younger kid was headed for the door with a bucket of water, and Aiden slouched a bit so as to look less intimidating and called out.

“Hey, could you get a parent or adult for me?” he asked in Common. Silas and his servants spoke it; it was worth seeing if he could get away with pretending not to know Toussaintois, just in case.

The kid gave him an intrigued look as they took in the mass of scars on his face, but they nodded and trotted inside calling for their mother. The woman who emerged a few minutes later was maybe in her thirties and seemed a little annoyed—Aiden suspected she was probably the daughter of the people who actually owned the house. She looked up from dusting her floury hands off on her apron and her eyes went wide; Aiden caught a whiff of fear as she realized exactly what was standing just outside her fence.

“Good morning,” Aiden said with a nod, pretending not to notice her upset. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I was hoping to trade for a bit of breakfast before I head out.”

“Oh?” she said, still wary, but the sour fear-scent started to fade.

“Didn’t want to get anyone in trouble over me dawdling. I don’t think he likes me very much,” he said, with a wry smile and a bit of a twitch of his head back towards the manor.

The woman’s mouth twitched upwards, just a tiny bit, and she lost a little of the tension in her shoulders. “Is there some kind of trouble near here?” she asked.

Aiden shook his head, still smiling a little. “He just needs me to collect some things for him. I was planning on staying in Toussaint for a while, so I figured I might as well.”

“Ah,” the woman said, softening further. She still seemed a little worried, but that could be any number of things, many of which were just part of his state of being. “We have some leftovers from breakfast, and I was just putting in a second batch of bread.”

“That sounds excellent,” Aiden said, with another quirk of his lips. “I have pennies or some jewelry I could pay with.” He pulled out the jewelry for her to look at, and noted the way her eyes lingered on the pendant he’d stuck in with the three rings. It was a pretty thing; silver gilt framing a smooth, polished oval of citrine about the size of his thumbnail. It was also worth more than breakfast was, but he’d pulled it out for a reason.

When she’d hesitated for just a couple moments too long, he looked at her and tilted his head slightly. “Is something wrong?”

“Oh! Oh, no,” she said, flustered. “Just, tuppence will be fine.”

Aiden hummed a little and put the rings back, palming the pendant and pulling out the pennies to show her.

She nodded at him and went back into the house, and Aiden petted Mouse’s muzzle while he waited. It was only a minute or two before she came back out with a wrapped bundle. Aiden took a couple of surreptitious sniffs and identified the contents as fresh bread, bacon ends, a bit of brie, a fresh egg or two, and, surprisingly, a small block of cotignac. He took the bundle with a smile and dropped the pennies and the pendant into the woman’s hand in exchange.

She looked down at the pendant and then back up at him in mild startlement. “Oh! Oh, I couldn’t,” she said, but she didn’t make to give him the pendant back.

“I don’t have a sweetheart to give it to,” he lied with as sweet a smile as he could muster, ignoring the lurching feeling of _Lambert could be dead and you’d have no idea_ , because he couldn’t focus on that right now. “So I’d rather it go to someone who would appreciate it.”

She actually blushed, which was rather sweet. That was Toussaint for you, though—high romance. He gave a little bow and mounted up, steering Mouse around and giving her a gentle nudge to get her moving on the road out of the town. He broke into a canter when they were clear, until they’d passed the point where they would be visible from the town, then he slowed Mouse down and dismounted.

“Good show, Mouse,” he said, giving her a pat. “Very dramatic.”

She snorted and nuzzled him in return. Aiden took a moment to look around a little more. The map the mage had given him had indicated he was actually very close to Beauclair, but the manor was in a spot where it was difficult to see the palace. It would still probably take him most of the day to get there, but the Ducal Camerlengo would be the best place to start looking for leads on everything Artorius wanted.

* * *

It was too late in the evening to go to the office of the Camerlengo when he got into Beauclair, so he headed to an inn instead and paid for a room and feed for both him and Mouse. He couldn’t get an inn in town if he wanted to lend credence to the idea of his being there to look for work, but he found a place only just outside of the Cooper’s Gate, rather than actually at the docks, which would hopefully be a little quieter.

The room, when he saw it, turned out to be not half bad. It wasn’t huge, but it was bigger than a lot of the cheaper inns Aiden had stayed at in his lifetime, and while it was a bit shabby, it was also pretty clean. The linens had actually been washed semi-recently and he could smell that they’d been stored with pennyroyal to drive away insects.

He’d eaten down in the public room of the inn, so he just put his saddlebags down and started getting ready to sleep, leaning his swords on the end table within easy reach and getting out of his armor. He would technically be fine without sleep a while longer, even without more meditation, but he had the opportunity and should use it while he could. In fact...

It was maybe a little idiotic and indulgent, but Aiden did actually possess a sex drive and finally had some actual privacy in a reasonably secure location, and he might as well take advantage of it. He deliberately blocked out his larger circumstances, because if he actually thought about his situation this was not going to be a very good time, and ran his hand lightly over the front of his braies, tugging the laces loose.

If he ever _didn’t_ think of Lambert while he was jerking off, something would have had to have wiped him from Aiden’s memory entirely; even then, Aiden suspected he would still know something was missing, a hole punched into him where something essential had once stood. It was enough to start just to think of his wolf’s face, the times he’d managed to make him blush dark enough to see. He _adored_ Lambert’s face, honestly—he was always so expressive, and Aiden loved seeing his eyebrows scrunch together and his lips purse when he was annoyed or concentrating, loved watching him go open and soft when they were alone and he forgot to be prickly or Aiden made him forget to be prickly. He looked so good when he wore makeup, too, gold eyes outlined and color on his mouth, and Aiden always, _always_ wanted to kiss him, lip paint or not, frowning or smiling. On his mouth, to start, but he’d trail down Lambert’s neck, undo the ties on his shirt to get at his collarbones—

“Gib?” said Artorius’ voice as the medallion Aiden was wearing buzzed.

Aiden _shot_ upright, yanked the silver sword free of its scabbard and cast Quen while the scabbard was still clattering on the floor, looking around the tiny room for the source of the voice. His braies were starting to fall, which would present a problem with footwork, but he wasn’t currently prepared to waste a free hand trying to hike them back up.

No portal, no detectable mage, nothing. Then the medallion buzzed again.

“My apologies, Gib. I didn’t intend to startle you like that.” Artorius’ voice said simultaneously, coming from—Aiden’s saddlebags?

 _Oh fucking **shit** ,_ Aiden thought. It was kind of the only thing he was thinking at the moment, actually, running on a loop.

He decided to take the chance to pull his braies back up, and approached the saddlebags cautiously.

Another buzz of the medallion. “You’re looking for a small object like a snuffbox. I packed it in the inner pocket on the left—”

Sure enough, that was the object that was somehow broadcasting Artorius’ voice.

“What,” Aiden managed, past the _oh fucking **shit**_.

“It’s called a xenovox,” Artorius said. “They’re a bit like megascopes, but they’re quite a bit rarer. They don’t transmit images, only sound, and they can only be controlled by one side.”

Okay, well, at least Artorius hadn’t _seen_ Aiden with his hand on his cock, but this new development was several nightmares all rolled into one and playing out in front of his eyes—or, perhaps, ears.

“It’s a less magically draining way to keep track of your progress,” the mage continued.

“So you can… hear me?” Aiden asked. Might as well plumb the depths of this brand-new horror.

“When I concentrate on it, yes. I had no idea you could be so charming, Gib,” Artorius said, sounding rather amused.

 _Oh fucking **shit**_ picked up the pace of its loop in Aiden’s head, which was not helpful in the slightest.

“It’s a good way to keep humans from freaking out,” he said, desperately trying to not convey his panic. It was technically true, but he also still _liked_ being friendly, liked being able to chat with humans and hear about their lives, make them a little better by ways other than the ones he was expected to.

“It’s very convincing,” Artorius said, still amused. “If I didn’t know better I might have believed you. That must be exhausting to keep up.”

“Less exhausting than being run out of town,” Aiden said, ruthlessly tamping down his relief. 

“True enough,” Artorius said warmly, “I’ll have to enjoy it while it lasts.” 

Aiden just _knew_ he was condescendingly thinking about how smart his pet Witcher was. At least he seemed to have convinced the man that Aiden hadn’t been acting abnormally around him.

“I know you’ll probably want some time to yourself,” Artorius said, rife with implication. “I’m going to check in with you a couple of times a week, at least, and I want to be able to hear what’s going on before I say anything, in case of trouble, but if you’ve muffled the xenovox I’ll check back later, unless it’s urgent.”

Aiden tensed again. He wasn’t exactly _shy_ , no Witcher was, but the idea of the mage and Aiden and sex in _any_ combination made him want to dig a hole and bury himself in it. Or to just gut the mage, but he couldn’t do that.

“Any particular days or times?” he forced himself to say.

“Every three, in the evenings to start,” Artorius said. “If you’re going to be busy, try to tell me ahead of time and we can schedule something different.”

“Understood,” Aiden said, and barely even heard the mage bid him a good evening.

A listening device. He was carrying around a godsdamn _listening device_ , and he couldn’t even keep it rolled up in his spare socks for too long, lest the mage get suspicious. This trip was going to be hell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Vicarious embarrassment: Aiden believes he has a moment of actual privacy and starts mastrubating, only to be interrupted by what is essentially a phone call from Artorius, which is basically automatically answered on Aiden’s end. It turns out the device being used can transmit sound both ways, and while Aiden initially reacts like there might be a threat of some kind, he eventually starts realizing that he still has no real privacy.
> 
> The mage also knows this, and hints that Aiden can muffle the device so that he can have sex or mastrubate, and Aiden starts feeling rather squicked out at that point.
> 
> The mage didn’t actually know what Aiden was doing when he called, and Aiden did grow up around people who could hear everything, but these are pretty different circumstances.
> 
> \--
> 
> Also yes I know that in Witcher 3 Toussaint uses crowns, but that makes absolutely no sense so I changed it.
> 
> I also decided Toussaintois is the name for both the language and the people, much like 'French' is.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, mild bit of Aiden eating some grapes that could be a little bit squicky, here. There's not too much description of it, but you can check the end notes for some information!

Aiden didn’t pay for breakfast for himself the next morning; he collected the fucking xenovox, the cotignac, and a chunk of cheese and paid the innkeep to keep an eye on his saddlebags, then wandered though the streets of Beauclair, eating the food and refamiliarizing himself with the city. He took the long route, winding by the Metinna and Lebioda Gates. He felt his shoulders easing a bit as he walked along, looking at the bright-painted buildings and riotous arrangements of plants almost dripping from the walls. It was early enough that there weren’t many rich merchants or nobles out, so he was free to enjoy the sun on his face without having to walk through constant clouds of too-strong cologne or hear much whispering about his scars.

Eventually he wound up near the Pheasantry inn and eating-house. The flowers growing all over the building perfumed the air, and he could smell the bakery just below the inn and the inn cooks already starting to make lunch—something with a lot of duck fat in it, by the smell. Aiden ignored his stomach rumbling and leaned on a railing, looking out at the lake that separated the city from the palace. The lake was actually pretty clean; most of the waste of the city went into the Sansretour.

He caved to his stomach right around the time the Camerlengo would be opening, and made the walk up to Knights Dormant Square with an almond croissant in hand. Outside the office, he brushed a few lingering crumbs off, made sure nothing had gotten twisted around on his armor, pasted a smile on his face, and walked in.

The interior was fairly close and dark, despite the lit candles everywhere. Aiden headed down the short hallway that led to a larger room that held several bookshelves and two desks. Thankfully, Aiden was early enough that the only other person here was the Ducal Camerlengo himself, sitting behind one of the desks, browsing several stacks of paper. The man looked up when Aiden approached the desk.

"Oh my! A Witcher!" the man said, peering into Aiden's face. "It's been several years since I've seen one of your kind here."

Aiden kept his smile polite. "It's been a while since I've been in Toussaint as well. Tell me, is this still the place to pick up general contracts?"

"Indeed it is," the man said cheerfully. "I only just received the fresh reports for today, but everything else is sorted by the type of trouble, over there."

'There' was the second desk, with four lists unrolled on its surface. One was for monsters, one for bandits, and one for wild animals, and one for unknown troubles. There were four columns on each, listing the actual or presumed problem, the date the issue was brought to the Camerlengo's attention, a location, and an ID number for the office’s reference. As knights completed jobs, they were crossed off the lists, and fresh lists were drawn up every other week—or at least they had been when Aiden was here last.

Aiden made sure to mentally note the locations of the larger groups of bandits—he had no interest in getting anywhere _near_ the three hanses that appeared to have taken over some of the castle ruins near the edges of Toussaint if he could help it—before perusing the ‘monster’ and the ‘unknown’ lists.

“I’m going to need the additional information on a lot of these,” he said as he was looking.

“Oh? Well, read off the IDs, I’ll jot them down and it can be done in one group instead of one at a time.”

Aiden waited until the shuffling of paper had stopped, then began to read off IDs. He halted at fifteen and gave the lists one last look before turning to nod at the Camerlengo.

The man’s eyebrows were up near his hairline, but he headed over to one of the shelves to start collecting the write-ups for each of the contracts. While he was busy, Aiden amused himself reading some of the paperwork on the man’s desk from where he was standing across the room. Most of it wasn’t too interesting, but then a date caught his eye.

 _ **1273?**_ Aiden couldn’t help staring at it in complete shock. That— fuck, _fuck,_ he’d known it had been literal years, but some of his memories of the early bits were so fragmented that he’d thought— he’d _hoped—_ what had he _missed?_ At least one more war with Nilfgaard, he remembered Artorius mentioning that starting again— mage burnings by the Church of the Eternal Fire—

The Camerlengo started to turn and Aiden snapped his eyes up and composed his face to keep from being caught snooping. He handed Aiden the stack and Aiden further shoved down his feelings and started reading through the papers—these documents were much more detailed than the lists were. Neither of the two contracts on giant centipedes mentioned any _leucistic_ ones, more the pity for Artorius’ plans. There were two contracts that almost certainly weren’t monsters, and he put those down while he browsed the other nine. In the end, he had ten contracts he figured he would see out.

“These two,” he said, picking up the two he’d set aside first, “Probably aren’t monsters. This one sounds like people purposely scaring villagers off—they might’ve found something valuable and are trying to keep it for themselves. And this one is probably a panther that’s got something keeping it from hunting normal prey.”

The Camerlengo looked at him in shock. “You can tell just from this?”

“I won’t say they _couldn't_ be anything else, especially without having seen things for myself, but those are the most likely possibilities from what’s mentioned here,” Aiden clarified. “No one has gone missing near the supposed haunting and some of the described phenomena track to humans with alchemical substances instead of wraiths, and the remains they found for the other one—monsters can and most often do eat more of a corpse than that.”

The Camerlengo hummed thoughtfully and took the papers, still looking almost insultingly startled. Aiden just gave him a deep nod and tucked the papers away as he headed for the door. He _could_ keep them, at least—they were copies of a master set, and doubtless the Camerlengo would set scribes draw up another set of copies today, so that another knight or Witcher could take up the tasks if Aiden were to ditch a contract or die in an attempt.

On his way back to the inn to collect his things and Mouse, Aiden stopped by the noticeboard near the Gran’Place—the Ducal Camerlengo only collected contracts that affected the safety of Toussaint as a whole, rather than an individual's problems. He wasn't sure if he would call his luck in or not—there was a plea for aid at a vineyard with another centipede infestation. Aiden took the page with him and considered his mental map of Toussaint.

_Now, the closest contract… Corvo Bianco vineyard it is._

* * *

Aiden rode up to the main house on the Corvo Bianco estate about three hours later, after having spent almost the entire ride trying not to think about the _six years_ he’d been with the mage. Corvo Bianco was much shabbier-looking than he would expect from a working vineyard, especially one so close to Beauclair. It wasn't as though the centipedes were responsible for the neglect either; the chipped stucco was clearly an issue that had been building for a year or more.

He set the question aside for the moment and left Mouse tied to a rail near the house with another pat before approaching the door. No one answered his first knock, so he was a bit more emphatic with the second. He could hear someone moving towards the door after that, so he stepped back and let his lips quirk upwards slightly. Hopefully the xenovox, tucked back in Mouse's saddlebags, was far enough away that Artorius wouldn't be able to hear him.

The man who answered the door pretty clearly wasn't expecting a Witcher—or, at least, not one as beat-up looking as Aiden was. His eyes widened and his jaw dropped slightly.

"Good morning," Aiden said. "I saw the notice about a giant centipede infestation."

"Ah, indeed," the man said, a little nervous. "I'm afraid Baron Rossell isn't here at the moment, but I am his majordomo and should be able to act in his stead regarding the contract for the beasts."

"Of course, Monsieur…?" Aiden said. 

“Ah, François,” the majordomo said.

Aiden nodded. “How long ago did the centipedes show up?"

"A couple of weeks, we believe," François said, stepping outside and closing the door behind him. "There is not much activity in the vines in summer, you see, so we are uncertain of when exactly they moved into the southern field."

Aiden purposely didn’t grimace. “Do you have any idea how many there might be?”

“At least three, from the reports of the workers,” François said. “But they have been understandably reluctant to get too close.”

 _Well, pretty typical,_ Aiden thought. Out loud, he said, “Of course. They shouldn’t be putting themselves at risk. Can you point me at the nest?”

“If you’ll just follow me, Monsieur,” François said, and led Aiden up a small rise behind the house, which provided a good view of the estate.

With the better view, Aiden realized the shabbiness wasn't only limited to the main house, either—there were signs of disrepair and neglect everywhere. A decorative garden that Aiden could just see the corner of was choking with weeds; the servant's quarters' facades were in even worse repair than the main house's; the roof on a three-sided outbuilding was beginning to sag.

 _It's probably a good thing I don't actually need the pay for this,_ he thought.

He peered out at the field François pointed out to him, constricting his pupils to deal with the bright midmorning sun. There wasn’t any visible movement aboveground at the moment, which was only to be expected. Giant centipedes were nocturnal, though generally willing to arise at any hour to mutilate anyone or anything they felt passing above their tunnels.

François coughed slightly, and Aiden turned to look at him.

“If, perhaps, Monsieur could endeavor to do as little damage to the grape vines as possible?” he said. Aiden could actually smell the spike in his nervousness, it was so sharp.

“I’ll do what I can, Monsieur François,” Aiden said, with a reassuring smile. _Oh, they definitely can’t actually afford to pay me what they’re offering._

In the interest of not wrecking the south field, Aiden very, very slowly worked his way into the vines, listening hard for the sound of disturbed centipedes. The field smelled off, somehow, in a way that didn’t map to the acrid scent of centipedes, and Aiden spent some of the time spent in the crawling pace trying to figure out what it was. Sweet but cloying and musty at the same time. He couldn’t see anything on the grape vines, though, and he didn’t have time to stop and look at them more closely. He put it out of his mind after about fifteen minutes and continued onwards.

It took him almost an hour, but he couldn’t hold back a bit of a grin when he came upon the surface tunnel to the nest. He carefully lit a small selection of bombs and dropped them into the hole, cautiously backing up several paces as he drew the silver sword and got ready to cast Yrden.

Even that degree of activity started to draw the attention of the centipedes, but it was a bit too late. The grapeshot and samum bombs he’d dropped in went off, and he heard the eerie hissing of a centipede vocalizing and some thumping that probably indicated one was thrashing wildly. The ground under him started churning, and he cast Yrden and stepped back down the aisle of grape vines as a scorched and bleeding centipede burst from the ground, only to be immediately caught in the magical trap.

He darted forwards and dispatched the monster with a few swift sword blows to its underside, then concentrated to try and hear where the next attack was going to come from. He dived forwards into a roll, getting bits of centipede guts splattered on him, but it was better than the splash of corrosive goo that a third centipede shot at him from a couple of rows over. Aiden had to resort to a rather ungainly hop to get to it without getting caught in the string holding up the vines, but at least he didn’t snare himself in anything. He dispatched it with a little more difficulty than the other one; it had been far enough away that it wasn’t injured.

Then, of course, the ground started rumbling again, and Aiden leapt for safety as two more centipedes burst out of the ground. One got fouled up in the vines, which gave Aiden a moment to fire a bolt into the head of the other to keep it busy while he stabbed the tangled one. The shot one took another minute or two, since it did the smart thing and retreated underground, but he got it in the end.

None of the centipedes he could see were any paler than any other centipede he’d ever seen, so he bombed the section where the three had been clustered on the chance that it contained eggs. He debated about being nice and hauling out the corpses for the vineyard staff, but he was distracted by another whiff of musty sweetness near the fouled vines. It finally rang a bell and he crouched down to inspect some of the crushed grapes. 

It was only just starting to grow on the surface, but popping a few of the unsquashed grapes into his mouth confirmed it—there was some kind of fungus or mold that had infected the fruit. Actually, if you ignored or didn’t mind the slightly musty taste from the infection, the fruit was much sweeter than it usually was at this point of vine-drying, and really rather pleasant. It reminded him a bit of a Nilfgaardian method to make very sweet dessert wines—grapes were cut and dried in the sun for a while before they were used in wine production.

 _Hm. I wonder if they know about this._ If the infection was safe for human consumption, they might be able to make some real money on it. Of course, if it wasn’t, this might be the cause of the vineyard’s troubles. After thinking for a bit, Aiden broke off a bunch of the infected grapes and carefully set them in his belt pouch. That could at least serve as slight compensation for what they probably wouldn’t be able to pay him.

As expected, Monsieur François went a little pale when Aiden returned to, ostensibly, be paid. After listening to the man flounder for a bit, Aiden suggested that he receive instead a percent of the vineyard’s profits, in coin or in wine, after the year’s harvest. The majordomo almost cried with relief, and immediately went to draw up an official document and collect the Baron’s seal, which had been entrusted to him while the Baron was away.

Document stored safely in Mouse’s saddlebags, Aiden talked Monsieur François into letting him get cleaned up with a washbasin of water from the stream running though Corvo Bianco. It was early afternoon by the time he was done and mostly dry, and Aiden consulted his list of contracts again. He should probably check all the centipede contracts first—the next closest was near Flovive. He could probably get there by evening, too. Maybe he’d even run into some trouble along the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, Aiden eats some grapes infected with the fungus Botrytis cinerea, known to vintners who actually want it around as noble rot. It’s used in the production of a number of dessert wines. It’s entirely possible for it to get out of hand even when it’s wanted, and it does regularly destroy fruit and some vegetable crops yearly, but it’s a fascinating example of humans being weirdos who will try anything at least once.
> 
> I would call it approximately as gross a description as someone eating blue cheese, and you'll miss it if you skip the paragraph immediately after the sentence "It finally rang a bell and he crouched down to inspect some of the crushed grapes."


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy birthday to me! 🥳 Have some more Aiden whump!
> 
> On a more serious note, disturbing content warning here, for about the last third of the chapter. Check the end notes for a run-down.

The centipedes near Flovive weren’t anything special, in either challenge or coloring. Aiden was most of the way back into town when he overheard someone talking loudly to the alderman.

“The Countess Tiphaine Baudet de Sakhor is counting on clear roads to drive the sheep to Flovive, and there have been sightings of a great beast in the area! I cannot imagine that you wish to rouse her ire, nor to be left without that much of your cargo.”

The speaker was a small, handsome, officious-looking man who was probably a clerk of some sort. Almost certainly not terribly experienced, either, by the way he seemed to be completely missing the alderman slowly puffing his chest out in indignation. Aiden sighed, with just a little amusement, and headed over to save the clerk from his own attitude.

“Hello again,” he said to the alderman with a smile, blatantly interrupting.

“ _Monsieur!_ ” the clerk started, and nearly choked on his tongue as he belatedly took in Aiden’s appearance.

“Ah, Witcher,” the alderman said, looking slightly less bristly. “How went the fight?”

“No particular trouble,” Aiden said. “The ground is rather torn up, but at least the soil will probably do well from it.”

The alderman grunted in agreement. It probably would have been a different story if there had been growing something in that field, but it was currently lying fallow and some buried centipede bits might actually do it some good as fertilizer.

“I know you’re to be paid by the Camerlengo, but my wife insisted on a small gift, to show how thankful we are,” the alderman continued, and handed Aiden a small pouch that clinked slightly.

“Please thank her for me,” Aiden said, with a soft smile.

“ _Monsieurs_ ,” the clerk said, clearly over his shock.

“Yes?” Aiden said, turning to look at the clerk.

“I was attempting to impress upon Monsieur Gallet the importance of making sure the roads were cleared, when you so rudely butted in,” the man said heatedly.

“I’d heard,” Aiden said. “I wanted to let him know I had solved the immediate issue before speaking to you. A great beast, you said?”

“Ah,” the clerk said, taken aback.

“I _am_ a Witcher, after all,” Aiden continued, feeling just a little amused.

The clerk recovered. “Indeed! And I believe the Countess would be prepared to pay even a Witcher to ensure the safety of her investment.”

Aiden just kept smiling. “And the great beast? Has it attacked any animals or people?”

“No— the Countess’ guards have seen to that,” the clerk said with pride.

“But there are, perhaps, too few to be able to offer the same protection when driving the flocks?” Aiden prompted. It could be quite amusing to poke fun at people, but this one was making it too easy.

“Of— of course,” the clerk said, stumbling a bit at first but following up with a nod. “You understand the situation; it would be quite impossible for them, as dedicated and skillful as they are, to watch both Basane Farm and the shepherds on their way to Flovive.”

Aiden nodded with a serious expression as the alderman snorted.

“And the beast? What does it look like?” Aiden asked.

“Well. I have not seen it for myself, but the reports are that it is huge and hairy, and can go about on two or four legs. Some of the shepherds believe it to be a werewolf.”

Aiden blinked and nearly lost his smile as he replied without the words ever hitting conscious thought. “Of course I’ll investigate.”

“Excellent,” the clerk said, nodding. “The Countess will be pleased with your cooperation.”

“Will you be returning to the farm today or tomorrow?” Aiden asked.

“Tomorrow,” the clerk said.

Aiden nodded at him. “I’ll ride ahead today, then.”

The clerk blinked, startled.

“I can get a head start on the contract,” Aiden said with a smile, and privately thought, _and not have to ride with you the whole way_.

“Oh. Ah. Of course,” the clerk said. “I was about to suggest it myself.”

Aiden gave the clerk a wide smile, then turned and walked to where he’d left Mouse. He gave her a once-over to make sure she was still doing well, then mounted up and started walking her north.

* * *

Aiden and Mouse got to Basane Farm late the next morning. He’d slept overnight in a little lean-to in the fields near Dun Tynne that had kept the dew off, and headed out again before any of the workers showed. He knew he was near the farm when he started smelling lanolin and sheep dung. He was near the flocks within the next ten minutes, and came to a halt to talk to one of the shepherds.

“Good morning!” he called. “You wouldn’t work for the Basane Farm, by chance?”

The shepherd gave him a suspicious look. “Who wants to know?”

“I’m a Witcher, asked by a clerk or somesuch who works for the farm to investigate monster sightings nearby.”

“Ah,” the shepherd said, consideringly. “That’d be Raoul. _Monsieur_ Raoul, to most. Aye, we’ve been catching a few glimpses of something, but it’s not bothered us yet.”

“Where were you when you saw it?” Aiden asked.

“All over the place, mostly,” the shepherd said, and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You might want to talk to Jean-Pierre; he shears sheep and works as a barber, and swore he had a good look at the beast.”

“Thank you,” Aiden said with a smile, and rode on.

The farm itself was a collection of buildings spanning both sides of a creek that turned into a large pond right past, with a small bridge to walk over. It was a nice little place, with blue-painted buildings and a couple of children playing in the dirt yard.

One of the kids kindly pointed him to Jean-Pierre, and asked if they could see his sword in exchange. Aiden laughed a little, and showed the wide-eyed child the silver sword, although he had to emphasize not to touch. The matron watching him sharp-eyed from a window softened a tad at that restriction, and he got to show off a little to the kids, which he considered a success all around.

Jean-Pierre, on the other hand, proved to be of an extremely nervous disposition.

“I couldn’t, well, you must understand, I _saw_ something huge and terrifying off that way—” he gestured to the north, “But I couldn’t possibly tell you what’s out there, I’m just not familiar with the area.”

“You’re new here, then?” Aiden asked.

“We all are,” Jean-Pierre said. “Well, I’m newer than most. But the Countess only recently purchased the farm.”

Hm. That was interesting information, though Aiden didn’t know what it might signify yet. _Perhaps a deal of some kind that the previous people had with whatever-it-was?_ “Do you know who the previous owners or tenants were?”

“I’m afraid I don’t,” Jean-Pierre said. “You probably want to ask the overseer, since Raoul isn’t back yet.”

“Thank you,” Aiden said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

The overseer took a little work to find, but eventually Aiden tracked him down. He was doing paperwork in a small but well-fitted office that Aiden suspected actually belonged to the clerk Monsieur Raoul.

“Ah yes. Hubert and Gisèle Duret,” he said when Aiden asked about the previous tenants. “The Countess wished to bring in all her own people, so she had them evicted, a week after she bought the property.”

Aiden had to blink at that, absolutely stunned by the idiotic malice behind that decision. From the set of the overseer’s mouth, he shared some of the same feeling.

“I take it they didn’t mention much about the area,” he said, still a little stunned.

“You assume correctly,” the overseer said. “I’ve been trying to get the shepherds to note landmarks and the like, but we’re close to blind out here. The previous owner’d no useful maps at all.”

Aiden nodded in thanks and took his leave. He then spent the rest of the day investigating in a spiral pattern out from the farm, looking for tracks or traces he could follow. It turned out to be grueling work, anything that might have been a track of something monstrous obscured or easily lost, which only solidified that this was probably a sapient monster.

The fact that it was a sapient monster that hadn’t hurt _anyone_ so far didn’t matter one fucking bit to the compulsion spells. Aiden couldn’t stop from feeling jittery, on-edge; he kept turning around for noises that he’d already catalogued as innocuous, just in case something had changed. It was fucking awful.

At sunset, Aiden collected the fucking xenovox from Mouse’s bags and headed back into the woods. He had to think for a bit before he could decide what he wanted to say.

He settled for “I’m alone.”

Aiden stood there for a whole agonizing minute, wondering if it was too early to catch the mage, but right as he was about to give up and find dinner, his medallion buzzed as Artorius spoke.

“Such initiative, Gib.” At least he sounded amused.

“Going to go looking for something tonight,” Aiden said. “Think it might be a werewolf. Figured I’d check in before I head out.”

“Good hunting,” Artorius said, sounding like he wanted to say something more.

* * *

Aiden headed back into town, paid the matron overseeing the children for bread and cheese, and paid the overseer for fodder for Mouse. Neither bothered to overcharge him too much, which was nice. When they were finished, he went north into the woods, leading Mouse behind him. He wasn’t excited about putting her in potential danger, but he knew she could keep her head while he was fighting, and she could move much faster than he could, which might be essential if he got into trouble. He kept up a steady stream of reassurance as night began to fall; she was understandably a little nervous about the dark. He couldn’t say he was feeling as calm as he was pretending to be, given what he was about to do, but it wouldn’t help if Mouse bolted and hurt herself.

Aiden wasn’t quite an hour and a half of cautious progress out from the farm when he caught the scent of blood. It was extremely faint, but it was present, and that was enough for him to investigate. The scent was coming from off to the east, and, once he got to it, proved to be a faint stain in some recently-distubed dirt. A bit of digging gave him a whiff of decomposing intestines, and he grimaced and sneezed. Someone had dressed and bled an animal here, probably several days ago, and he doubted it was anyone from the farm.

He buried everything again and started out in a spiral, looking for a trail he could follow. He found what he was looking for not too far away; large tracks with small scratch marks showing long nails. This was definitely a werewolf, and they’d almost certainly been hauling the carcass away, and hadn’t been able to brush away the tracks.

 _They haven’t hurt anyone!_ Aiden couldn’t help thinking, but it didn’t matter. 

He collected Mouse and started following the prints. They didn’t deviate much, following a pretty direct path that went slightly west of north. Eventually he came to the creek again, near its origin at a branch of the Sansretour. The werewolf’s hideout had to be somewhere nearby. Aiden took a deep breath to try and brace himself and caught just a hint of smoke from a fire.

He left Mouse ground-tied so that she would hopefully have a chance at getting away if the werewolf came up on her expectedly and crossed the creek, trying to get as few of his things wet as possible. He followed the smell of smoke to a crack in the ground, and peered in to see there was definitely a cave down there. It took him a little more searching to find a person-sized entrance, set low in the ground only about ten meters from the bank of the Sansretour.

Aiden carefully climbed down into the cave, and drew his silver sword as he landed on the balls of his feet on the cave floor. There was one path leading further in, where the glow of the fire was, and he cautiously advanced. If the werewolf was here and transformed, they would almost certainly smell him first, but he _couldn’t_ not at least try to be stealthy.

He wanted to throw up.

There was a middle-aged peasant woman sitting next to the fire, a shawl pulled tight around her shoulders. Aiden stepped into the light, sword drawn, and she looked up and started, scrambling to her feet.

“Who— what?” she said, eyes wide with fear.

“I’m a Witcher,” Aiden said, the words rancid on his tongue.

“We’ve not harmed anyone!” the woman cried. “We were evicted, and we’re just living here—”

 _Oh gods. Oh **gods.** This is Gisèle Duret._ Aiden opened his mouth only for it to snap shut again, against his will. He tried again and nearly bit himself by accident.

“Please, we haven’t—”

“Run,” Aiden only just barely managed to rasp, around the choking ties strangling him. He did snap his teeth shut on part of his mouth at that one, and tasted copper as he bit through it.

“What?” Gisèle asked, baffled.

Aiden yowled wordlessly around a mouthful of blood, and lunged.

His first stroke landed lightly—far too lightly—across her chest. Not nearly enough to kill, but enough to harm. Enough to make her change. Gisèle cried out in pain and fear, a sound that tore at Aiden’s heart. She scrambled, trying to get past him, form shifting as she moved, and Aiden couldn’t keep himself from cutting her hamstring as she went by. She made another noise of pain and broke into a hobbling sprint for the mouth of the cave, and Aiden leapt after her. He couldn’t see her particularly well through the haze of tears pooling in his eyes, but he saw well enough to aim for her head when he caught up. The poor woman's head went rolling off into a corner of the cavern, and her claws dug deep gashes into the ground for a second or two while her nerves caught up. 

Now that Aiden was crying, he couldn't seem to stop, either, and his mouth didn't want to stop bleeding, so he was dripping tears and mucus and bloody drool all over everything, including the poor woman's corpse as he mutilated it further by flensing her. There was blood everywhere already from the decapitation, but Aiden couldn’t bring himself to move her corpse to a different part of the cave. 

He’d just _murdered_ a blameless and displaced peasant woman and couldn't even provide her any dignity in death. It was just—it was all too much. He clutched the skin to his chest when he was done and _howled_ , just for a moment, mourning the people he’d been forced to kill, the years of his life he’d lost being kept as a _pet_ —Karadin had gotten him in the throat and then across the arm, and he’d finally lost consciousness, only to wake up strapped to a table with the mage looming over him. He’d somehow thought it had only been three, maybe four years—he’d lost so much time, fuzzed out and faded from physical trauma or magic.

When he was finally reduced to little hitching breaths through his mouth, he forced himself to stand. He didn’t want to kill anyone else today, which meant he needed to leave, before her husband returned. He slung his horrible, grisly trophy over his shoulders and moved the head over to the body so that he could burn them to ash with Igni, and knocked down a hunk of stone with Aard to place on top, as a marker. He didn’t have time for anything truly elaborate, but he sacrificed a knife to scratch three words into the top, then shuffled to the exit of the cave.

_I don’t want payment for this._

Aiden walked back to where he’d left Mouse, still sniffling a bit, since he didn’t want to wipe his face with his blood-covered hands. He stripped off everything that shouldn’t get wet and just walked into the creek. He stayed in just long enough to clean most of the blood off, then collected everything and headed over to Mouse. She gave him a very concerned headbutt, snorting a little at the remaining blood, and he just leaned into it before moving around to dig in her saddlebags. He needed to make sure Gisèle’s husband, Hubert, wouldn’t follow him and get killed too—the vials the alderman’s wife had given him had included several oils that might smell strongly enough.

Aiden collected everything and got into the saddle, and started mixing while he rode. He had a suitably nose-burning concoction by the time he reached the crossroads near Basane. There was a knight on his way to the crossroads as well, which was a small blessing—the more people who trekked through, the harder it would be for the husband to track him. Aiden spread the oil mixture widely and continued on his way south. He might be able to make it to the Cockatrice Inn by morning, and he could go over all his gear and scrape down the murdered woman’s skin so it wouldn’t attract necrophages while he checked the last centipede site, just north of Francollarts.

He needed to find something he could do while riding other than think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disturbing content: Aiden is forced, via those compulsion spells he's under, to torment, murder, and skin a completely innocent woman who just so happens to be a werewolf. He is _extremely_ upset about this, and I’d say the actual scene doesn’t spend a huge amount of time lingering, but it’s definitely present.
> 
> There’s also a mention of animals being hunted and cleaned for food purposes, and Aiden finds the buried discarded organs. Again, not graphic, but present.
> 
> We’ve also made a marked departure from canon instead of being able to just pretend everything’s exactly as it was in Witcher 3 except Aiden’s secretly not dead, folks; Gisèle Durart is alive as of Blood and Wine in the game (although not for very long if you actually happen to run into her).


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo! Here I am, back again. Warning for a lot of giant centipede death here folks, things get a little gross.

Artorius contacted him again at dawn, just as Aiden was coming up on the Cockatrice Inn. 

“I’m fine,” Aiden said, trying not to grit his teeth. “It was a werewolf. I have the pelt. Going to investigate another centipede infestation before I drop it off.”

“Excellent,” the mage said, voice warm. “I wish you luck.”

Aiden made a noise of acknowledgement and put the fucking xenovox away, then headed for the inn.

At the Cockatrice Inn, Aiden scraped down the murdered woman’s skin and buried it in the depths of his saddlebags. Then he re-sharpened and re-oiled all his blades, and cleaned and mended his armor and went over the pieces with a lightly oiled cloth, resolutely shoving thoughts out of his head, until he was completely exhausted. He crawled into bed just as the noise downstairs underwent an uptick for the lunch crowd, and fell asleep listening to field workers and travelers chat with each other about crops and sore feet or muscles and small village politics. 

He couldn’t remember his dreams when he woke at sunset, but he felt vaguely unsettled. He tried his best to shake the feeling as he washed his face in the ewer of water left in the room and got dressed. The smell of food wafting up from below helped—something creamy, with shellfish and herbs.

The smell turned out to be crayfish chowder. Aiden ordered a bowl, and devoured the whole thing in record time. He could taste onion, garlic, dill, and herbs in abundance in the creamy broth, and the crayfish was perfectly cooked, flaky and light. He generally preferred the little things spicy, like you could get around Pereplut, but this was a good second, and he made sure to praise the recipe within the hearing of the chef.

When Aiden was done, he went and checked on Mouse, who seemed none the worse for the nighttime ride. He spent a while petting and grooming her, then returned to his room for another couple hours of sleep. If he left around midnight, he’d reach the centipede hotspot not too long before dawn; late enough that the beasts would be starting to settle, but not so late that he’d have to rile them up again.

* * *

Aiden had managed to time things perfectly. He left Mouse tied to a tree several minutes out from the Mère-Lachaiselongue Cemetery, using a knot that she’d be able to pull free from, given a sharp enough tug—he’d much rather have to track down a loose mount than come back and find a dead one. That done, he grabbed a Golden Oriole and several bombs and headed for the location marked on the contract. 

Aiden took the potion as he came up on the cemetery; the report had indicated that this was not a nest to fuck around with. He scraped his tongue against his teeth to get rid of some of the chalky, bitter taste of the mixture and shivered a little as he felt it take effect. There were several centipedes above the ground among the gravestones, feeding on the body of a ghoul. He debated his approach for a moment, then did something Lambert had made him promise to do as _infrequently as he possibly could,_ and held onto a lit bomb for a couple of seconds so that it exploded almost immediately after he tossed it into the group of centipedes. They all reeled, hissing angrily, and he dashed in and eviscerated two of them before they could recover. One did get a jab in on his arm as he was turning around, but the Oriole was going strong and the wound just itched and stung like hell as it started to close over. He decapitated the centipede in exchange, and nearly took another angry insect to the ribs as he noticed that the underside of the monster was a ghostly white color.

_**Fuck.** _

He managed to freeze the one with a Yrden and slit it up the middle, then dodged out of the way as two more came to the surface to try and kill him. He was in the middle of dispatching them when a third spat a gobbet of poison into his hair. Things got a little chaotic after that, as a seemingly never-ending stream of the damn things kept popping up. He actually had to take a second Golden Oriole and a Tawny Owl to keep up, and started making use of gravestones as momentary shields when he needed a second to breathe.

_Finally_ the centipedes stopped attacking him, and he was left panting in the middle of the graveyard, feeling like his veins were on fire. He’d gotten close to his limit on toxic shit there, and while some of it had worn off by now, it still left him hurting. Furthermore, everything was covered in centipede guts, including him, and he groaned while he contemplated the amount of cleaning he was going to have to do.

The sword was first; it got a good wipe-down before he did anything else. He was probably going to need to use it again soon, so he didn’t do much more than that for the moment. Next he piled all the centipede corpses together, trying to ignore the cold knot in his stomach at their white underbellies, and lit them on fire; this wasn’t a spot where he’d be able to count on local clean-up. He had a small sneezing fit at the scent of charring insectoid, and wiped gobbets of gore off of himself as he poked around looking for the main entrance to the nest.

Fifteen minutes later, Aiden was peering down into an open sarcophagus. At some point, the bottom of the stone structure had crumbled, and the grave had turned into a quick entrance into what looked like a cave system. 

“Lovely,” Aiden muttered. “Spelunking for centipedes.”

There wasn’t any good way to climb back up that he could see, so Aiden was going to have to take a few precautions. He had a good, strong length of rope coiled in his bags, so he retrieved that, a few more potions, and a medium-sized cloth bag from Mouse and returned to the entrance. He tied the rope securely around a sturdy cross-shaped headstone, then tested the knot and the stone to make sure it would hold up to his weight or to him suddenly putting tension on it. Both stayed perfectly steady, and he let the end of the rope down into the cavern, made sure he had everything he needed handy, then climbed down into the dim underground.

“Now if I were a centipede…” Aiden murmured as he looked around the cave. He couldn’t hear anything from either direction the passage went in and the goop still clinging to him was giving his nose a damn hard time, but there had been what looked like the entrance to a small crypt in the eastern section of the cemetery. If it was in the same shape as the rest of the place, it was probably drawing scavengers.

_West it is. I’ve never known a centipede to nest too close to their hunting grounds._

He was forced to take a Cat eventually as he kept going down and down, and the miniscule amount of light faded. Thankfully there weren’t too many branching pathways, and most of them dead-ended or got too narrow for Aiden or a centipede to fit through within a dozen meters or so. It took time to check each side passage and mark them with a bit of chalk, and Aiden didn’t quite manage to hit that meditation-like state of a Witcher working on a repetitive but dangerous task; he was too busy trying not to think about additional experimentation, additional mutations. 

Lambert had told him a lot about Geralt. And everything he’d heard suggested the White Wolf did just fine. It wasn’t like Artorius wouldn’t do anything and everything he could to prevent Aiden from coming to permanent physical harm—hell, he even tried to prevent him from being in pain. He’d live through whatever the mage did to him. He’d come out in good shape. He even probably wouldn’t be in agony the whole time. He’d just have yet another thing done to him, that changed his body, without having any choice about it whatsoever. Another day as a Witcher. Another day as a _pet_.

There was a skittering noise from up ahead that snapped him out of his thoughts. He drew the silver sword and crept forwards. The passage opened up slightly, ahead, and Aiden could make out long pale bodies, curled and twisted around— eggs. They glimmered pearly blue-white in the gloom; each one was easily the size of both of his fists. They would be pretty, if he were capable of ignoring the baleful promise they represented. And if he was stupid enough to not realize monsters were, generally, a lot more trouble than they were worth. After having to deal with the one idiot who’d wound up with an infestation in their house buying some not-actually-preserved eggs from a highly unscrupulous merchant, the gloss had rather worn off.

There was a little more noise; the centipedes had probably felt him approaching, but they were pretty dedicated to protecting their clutches. They wouldn’t leave them to attack him until he was clearly threatening the eggs.

_Time to make that obvious,_ Aiden thought, taking a third Golden Oriole. He was maybe pushing the limits of what he should be taking, but they would try to poison him from a distance first, and he really didn’t fancy trying to down a potion while in entirely-avoidable agony. He shook his head a little as a couple of red sparks floated around at the edge of his vision and a headache started up, and reminded himself to either take a White Honey or spend a couple hours meditating before he got into any more fights.

He couldn’t do anything that would take the chance of destroying too many of the eggs, and it wouldn’t be a great idea to use Aard in a cave, so he grabbed the crossbow, carefully aimed for the closest flash of white underbelly, and loosed. The centipede lashed in agony when the bolt connected, sending eggs spilling across the rough floor of the cavern, and three other pale heads went up, ready to return fire.

Aiden stepped to the side so that he didn’t take the toxic goop to the face, smoothly reloaded the crossbow, and fired again. A second centipede reeled, and one of the others took advantage to splatter another wad of poison across his torso.

“I’m afraid that’s not going to work,” he murmured as he fired a third time, quickly re-holstered the crossbow, and drew his sword as the remaining centipedes left their eggs to try and rip him to pieces.

They weren’t really too much harder to kill than the others, especially given three of them were already wounded. There was a slightly hairy moment when one popped out from a patch of dirt in the ceiling over him to try and bite his head off, but he flinched when he saw something coming for his face and managed to get out of the way. He was well in form, enough so that the sparks indicating too much toxicity hadn’t dissipated by the time he’d killed everything attacking him.

Aiden sighed heavily and stretched before wiping more gore and poison off of himself, using a corner of the sack to clean off the sword before he had to head into the open space. He wasn’t accustomed to handling centipede eggs with the intent to not break them, so it took a little experimenting to figure out how many he could safely carry. He was going to have to be careful with the sack, and would probably have to buy a set of panniers to keep everything from jostling too much. When the sack was full, Aiden gathered the rest of the eggs but couldn’t manage to make himself destroy them.

“Oh this is _bullshit!_ ” he yelled, too keyed up from the toxicity to keep his mouth shut and too far away from the fucking xenovox to care. “I have _sixteen_ of them, and if Artorius manages to fuck up that badly with them these will all be dead or hatched and gone _anyway!_ ”

The compulsion didn’t bend, and Aiden marched out of the cavern with a bag full of eggs and another pile gleaming behind him, vociferously utilizing some of Lambert’s favorite curses. He’d mostly calmed down by the time he got back to the rope leading out, and after a little thought, tied the sack to the bottom of the rope, climbed up, and carefully hauled the sack up after him. He checked the contents—nothing broken—untied the rope, and headed back to collect Mouse so he had access to his soap and conditioner for his armor. The Sansretour was _right there_ , he was going to spend the time to get himself clean before he started back to Silas’ manor to drop things off.

It was getting on into afternoon by the time he’d cleaned everything, and Aiden had watched the stark black veins fade from his hands and color return to his skin as the toxicity faded. He still had a throbbing headache, but that wasn’t exactly new, and would recede after he got some meditation in. As it was, though, he didn’t exactly feel comfortable hauling still-living centipede eggs across a populated area, and he wanted to make it through the outskirts of Beauclair sooner rather than later, so he packed up and started heading northwest. He’d be able to pick up some panniers near the docks, and they might be able to reach Silas’ manor by evening. He didn’t want to spend the night there, but he wanted to take the chance of the eggs hatching on him even less.

“Well, we’ve got a plan,” he said in Mouse’s ear, stroking her muzzle. “Let’s go.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feeling a little less confident about this one, but staring at it for another week probably won't help.
> 
> MASSIVE thank-you to Laurelnose for helping me beat this into a somewhat more canon-realistic shape, and for more info on how to preserve tissue that's probably going to come up next chapter!
> 
> Finally, you may want to check the end notes for some warnings.

It took Aiden slightly longer to get through the outskirts of Beauclair than he thought, but it meant that the tiny village near Silas’ manor was mostly asleep by the time he rode in. The stablehand took Mouse readily enough and promised to have her rubbed down and fed, for which Aiden thanked them with a smile. The doorman at the manor gave him a marked look of distaste, but let Aiden in with the panniers and his saddlebags, which was all he needed.

Aiden made his way through the manor to the tower as quickly as he could. There was a tray of food sitting just outside on a small table, and Aiden picked it up to bring in. He hadn’t had supper, so he might as well eat the food instead of leaving it to whatever spell Artorius had set to make it seem like Silas was still alive. The lock on the door clicked open as Aiden touched it, and Aiden ruthlessly squashed a flinch and slipped in. He pressed himself to the wall to make sure nothing overlapped the circle with the half-made golem in it on the first floor, and carefully didn’t look at where Silas’ preserved corpse lay on the second floor, setting the tray down on a table and the saddlebags and panniers near it on the floor.

Aiden dug out the skin of Gisèle Duret to place on top of the panniers, and didn’t even have time to pull out the fucking xenovox before a portal opened in the room and Artorius stepped through. The mage’s eyes went wide and greedy when he saw the panniers, and he looked at Aiden with a smile.

“Gib, did you—” he said.

“Pale widow eggs,” Aiden confirmed.

Artorius smiled even wider, and reached out to cup Aiden’s face in his hand. 

“Glorious,” he breathed.

“I’m not sure how close they might be to hatching,” Aiden said, hoping to distract the mage before he started a monologue.

Thankfully it worked. The mage let go of him and nodded.

“Any plans on where you’re going next?” he asked, testing the weight of the panniers.

“I thought I might head north. There’s a kikimore nest up there, apparently. I’ll have a look and see if I can handle it by myself or if I’d need help.”

Artorius looked up from the eggs and smiled again. “I’ll contact you tomorrow evening, perhaps, to see if you need help?”

Aiden grunted, which proved to be enough of an answer. Artorius opened another portal and took the panniers and the skin through with a nod, and Aiden sat down and pulled the tray of food over. The dinner tray held grilled fish, salad with olives, oil, and slices of hard-boiled egg, cheese, bread, and a glass of wine. It probably would have tasted better if it wasn’t for the circumstances. Aiden had to stop himself from bending the utensils, thinking about another eye, about more changes to his body, his _self_ , that he couldn't control.

When Aiden was done, he left the tray and the empty dishes outside the door and headed down to the stables. Sleeping there would fit with both the idea that Silas had begrudgingly hired him for something and his own desire to not spend another night in that tower.

* * *

Aiden left Silas’ manor just before dawn and started north. It wasn’t too long of a ride, and the morning turned out to be a beautiful one; cool for the time of year, but skies clear and brilliantly blue. It was, of course, too good to last.

Aiden knew something was wrong almost immediately after he reached the outskirts of the supposed kikimore nest. The swamp itself was eerily quiet. There wasn’t any movement except the vegetation swaying in the breeze, and he couldn’t hear the slight clicking noises of moving kikimore. Aiden took a long, deep breath, trying to taste the air, and caught the scent of charred insectoid. He narrowed his eyes and dug in the saddlebags until he could pull out the spyglass, and used it to scan the swamp. 

Aiden couldn’t see anything unusual from where he was, but he kept smelling smoke. He was going to have to get closer. He put the spyglass away and tied Mouse lightly to a tree, then drew the silver sword and slunk forward in a low crouch, trying to disturb as little of the tall grass as he could.

Several minutes later, Aiden circled around a rise and sucked in a breath as he saw a pile of dead kikimores. There were easily a dozen workers, four warriors, and one massive corpse that could only be a kikimore queen. Just beyond the pile of bodies was what looked like a medium-sized group of humans, scattered around the remains of a massive bonfire. Aiden scowled. There was no fucking way that a group of maybe eighteen humans had killed a kikimore queen and all of the dead workers and soldiers there were lying there—not to mention that the smell of burnt insectiod meant that there had probably been even more of them.

A flash of red caught his eye as he was looking over the group. Most of the people there had armor or weapons near their sides, visible scars or signs of hard work, but here were three flawless-seeming women, one redhead and two brunettes, dressed in light, flowing clothing.

 _Vampires,_ Aiden thought. _An alp and two bruxae, most likely. That would explain the dead kikimore queen, at least. What the hell are they doing hanging out with a group of humans?_

He inched forwards until he could hear a snippet of conversation.

“—ghouls,” someone said, and one of the vampires tossed her head and said “—take care of it— —told you—smoke’s too visible—”

Aiden was going to _have_ to go over there and do something about the vampires, at very least. Fuck.

The group was upwind, so as long as he didn’t draw a sentry’s eye with too much movement, he should be able to get close. He spent at least ten minutes sneaking closer and was probably ten meters out before one of the bruxae noticed him.

“You there!” she called. “Show yourself.”

Aiden stood slowly, keeping his sword tip pointed down at the ground. 

“Come closer,” the alp said, eyes narrowing.

Aiden eyed the bandits, who were starting to get up, and took several steps towards the vampires. He wanted to try to get into sword range for when the fight inevitably broke out. Getting surrounded by the humans was a definite downside, but if he could kill the vampires quickly enough—

“Well now, seems we have someone lookin’ to make a donation to our cause,” one of the bandits said, hefting a huge warhammer.

“Witcher,” one of the bruxa said venomously. The bandits backed up a bit, though Aiden couldn’t tell if it was because of him or her tone.

“Witcher indeed,” Aiden said. “The Ducal Camerlengo wants this area cleared.”

“They want to sell the land,” the man with the hammer said. “Too bad we got here first, eh?”

“There is a reward for taking care of the problem,” Aiden ventured. “You would be well within your rights to go claim it.”

“Not worth leaving a good spot,” the alp said, tossing her head slightly.

“An’ we’re happy to stay, love,” the chatty bandit said, blowing the alp a kiss. She fluttered and cooed at him a little in return.

“You are aware that they’re vampires,” Aiden said to the man, projecting his voice slightly.

Most of the scruffy group laughed. They’d finished surrounded him, but nobody was attacking yet. “After the way they took out those kikimores, we’d be stupid to think otherwise!”

Aiden wasn’t stupid enough to close his eyes, but he sighed.

“Enough,” hissed the second bruxa. “He dies.”

She lunged for him, and he cast Quen and thrust the sword forward in a move that belonged more to fencing than Witcher styles. Thankfully, the bruxa didn’t get out of the way in time, and impaled herself on the blade even as her claws skidded off the glowing shield surrounding him. An arrow smashed into his back only a few moments after, which broke the Quen and sent all the bandits within range reeling back from the dispersed force from the shield.

Aiden took the moment to rip the sword free and behead the bruxa.The other bruxa screamed, and Aiden dashed to the side, cutting down a couple of people to try and get out of the way. The bandits were packed in too tightly, and he grimaced, sure he was about to be thrown like a rag doll. Instead, as he whipped around to remove a hand from a bandit, still trying to make a space to dodge through, he saw the bruxa making an impatient gesture. Several bandits backed away from him.

 _They don’t want to kill the humans_ , Aiden realized, and only just threw himself out of the way in time as the scream tore up the ground where he’d been standing. The alp was on him almost immediately afterwards, and he only barely managed to block her claws before they could rearrange his face. He managed to surprise her with a kick to the gut, which backed her up enough that he could take several swings at her. She dodged most of them, and Aiden caught more movement out of the corner of his eye and whipped the sword around to cut down another bandit. He was getting surrounded again.

There were still eleven of them, and the two vampires. Not ideal. He barely parried another strike from the alp, and realized he’d lost track of the bruxa. He got a Quen up just in time to prevent the invisible vampire from ripping out his spine, and took a desperate swing at the alp as she swayed back from the recoil of the shield breaking. Sheer dumb luck sank the sword deep into the alp’s torso, and her scream of pain cut off with a gurgle. While he was wrenching the sword free from the alp’s collarbone, someone bellowed in outrage, and Aiden just caught sight of something swinging towards him.

Pain _exploded_ into being in his arm and side as the warhammer smashed into him. Aiden's vision temporarily went white, and when it came back, he noticed red creeping in around the edges. 

_Oh fuck, not **now!**_

Of course, the blood rage didn't care. Aiden had time to hope that Mouse was too far away for him to bother trying to kill before he yowled at the top of his lungs and threw himself at the man as the red mist descended.

* * *

Aiden woke up drenched in tacky, drying blood and in mind-numbing pain, which was in no way unusual for the aftermath of going berserk. At least he wasn't in the other possible state, which he found genuinely surprising, given that there’d been a bruxa left alive when he’d lost it. 

He couldn't see anything moving when he forced his eyes open, which was good enough for the moment. Aiden let go of the sword and groped in agony for his belt pouch. He hoped desperately he didn't have any holes in his lung; he didn't have the time to spend recovering from that.

His left arm was one massive excruciating throb, and every shallow, tentative breath he took set off bright sparks of stabbing pain in his ribcage. He finally pulled the vial of Swallow free, locking his trembling fingers tight around the glass, and brought it to his face to pull the cork loose with his teeth and down it. Aiden probably screamed as his bones slowly scraped their way back into place, but he was too busy whiting out again to hear it.

When his vision came back, he no longer felt quite as much like he was about to die. His arm was straight again and none of his ribs felt like they were in the wrong places, which was a much more definite improvement as well.

 _Gods all bless healing potions,_ Aiden thought, not for the first time. _And gods all bless the magic that keeps bones from healing wrong when I take them_.

Of course, he wasn't anywhere near fully healed; he could still feel cracks in multiple ribs, his arm was telling his brain that it thought it might be on fire, he had an agonizing migraine, and he felt like he'd been beaten all over with sandbags—but if he could find his saddlebags, he could take another healing potion or two and improve on some of that.

He picked up the sword again despite a series of stabbing pains from his side, because he could just _hear_ Guxart yelling at him for letting go of his weapon, and had a second look around the battlefield. He couldn't see any bits of corpse larger than a human torso, and he sighed as deeply as he could around his still-broken ribs. At least he hadn’t wandered far enough afield to kill Mouse. Of course, that meant he needed to get to her, because she was carrying most of his supplies.

He limped over to an opening in the hill and peered inside. The bandits had clearly been setting it up as a hideout—there were bedrolls and stacks of supplies inside. He’d have guessed from the entrance that it was a natural cavern, but he could see some gorgeous carved pillars and stone sarcophagi set into the sides. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to have backed anyone into it, so it was relatively gore-free. He wiped down the sword with someone’s spare shirt, gritting his teeth against the pain that moving the left side of his body caused, and re-sheathed it. A full cleaning would have to wait. 

Hands now free, he grabbed a small, empty pot by the handle from a set of cooking implements and some more clothing, and shuffled a dozen meters or so to the Sansretour to get some of the blood off his face, hair, and hands. His ribs and arm were screaming loudly by the time he was done, but at least he probably didn’t look as much like a gore monster anymore. The last thing he needed was some poor peasant thinking he was a ghoul or something and getting him into _another_ fight.

Then, as clean as he was going to get for now, he started for where he’d left Mouse.

“Fuck,” Aiden said, seeing a number of panic-deep hoofprints headed south at the tree where he’d left her.

Aiden didn’t blame her for fleeing—he’d heard some of the sounds a blood-maddened Cat could make. He could either track her down and come back, hoping the bodies would be in a state for him to collect what he had to when he returned, or he could do the best job he could harvesting what he needed now and _then_ go track her down. At least he wasn’t being forced to take one or the other option.

Aiden considered trying to pull teeth and cut out venom sacs and remove a damn nerve _intact_ in his current state and winced. He shaded his eyes with his good hand—despite having his pupils as constricted as he could get, the late afternoon sun was still making his head throb—and started following the hoofprints, at a rather pathetic walk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains Aiden getting quite a few broken bones from a hit to the side with a warhammer. The impact happens shortly before the second line break and there's quite a bit of description of Aiden being in agony to relatively serious pain for the rest of the fic. It's most intense immediately after the line break, and there's a short description of healing potions magically setting broken bones being extremely painful. I would call it a bit more intense than the fight with the golem.
> 
> Additionally, Aiden goes berserk due to the damage he's sustained and makes casual mention of how he would have killed his horse if she were too close by. (Mouse is fine, just a little freaked out.)
> 
> (Incidentally, going berserk when seriously injured is my answer to "Cats are emotionally unstable". I adopted the idea from [Bomberqueen17](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bomberqueen17/pseuds/bomberqueen17), specifically how she chose to deal with the adrenaline point mechanic from Witcher 3 in her story [Dangerous Comforts](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24038059). In that story, the reaction is an undesirable one, but I can see a group of Witchers or their mage thinking it might provide a greater chance of killing a monster if the Witcher fighting it went into a rage if they were reaching possible death. Unfortunately, if it happens around people...)


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, we've covered most of the things I wanted to cover in Toussaint— we're going to be wrapping that up soonish!
> 
> Check the end notes for some (mild) warnings!

Aiden couldn’t find the second bruxa’s body. 

Mouse had, thankfully, not been more than an hour away, and hadn’t seemed too scared of him when he staggered over to her. He’d taken another dose of Swallow, which had gotten him into good enough shape that he’d been able to look her over—no lameness or other injuries, thank the gods—and ride her back to the camp. He’d started with the kikimore queen, spending a good half-hour prising the exoskeleton loose and _carefully_ cutting out the major nerve. He’d had to sit down in relief after he’d popped it into one of his jars filled with preserving alcohol.

After that he’d taken a number of other, less essential bits from the kikimores, and finally gone to collect the humanoid corpses, which led back to his current dilemma. There were undeniably only two dead vampires present: he’d even checked out at least ten meters in every direction.

“Shit,” he muttered. He was going to have to be extremely careful for a while, in case she tried to ambush him looking for revenge.

Aiden unhappily harvested ingredients from the vampires—salivary glands, tongues, blood, and fangs—and carefully marked the containers he put them into so he—so _Artorius_ —could distinguish bruxa from alp. He didn’t bother to search the bandits too carefully; it wasn’t as if he was hard-up. When he was finished—and had found a locket with a curl of red hair in it on the remains of the man with the hammer that made his stomach twist in sympathy—he piled all the corpses into the same space as the remaining kikimores. It wasn’t too far from the remains of the bonfire, but just to be sure, Aiden spent yet more time clearing about twenty meters of the area around it to make sure nothing flammable was in range before lighting the whole pile. That task complete, he washed more gore from his hands and arms and settled in a comfortable distance away, near the cave entrance, to keep an eye on the massive bonfire and to clean and care for all his gear.

 _Hopefully nobody thinks the entire swamp is aflame._ People would only be able to see the smoke, tucked away as the burn site had been—which was probably the point, in fact. A nest of kikimores was a much greater deterrent than not quite twenty humans, or even fifteen humans and a couple of humanoid vampires. People never tended to take humanoid monsters quite as seriously as they should.

A couple of villagers did come to peer from across the river at the massive column of smoke during late afternoon. Aiden fought his way free of the tall vegetation and waved until he caught their attention and gestured to the two swords on his back, trying to communicate that he had everything under control. The villagers discussed among themselves for a little while, but eventually waved back and left, which Aiden took to be them believing him.

“We’ll see if they feel the need to come over, eh?” Aiden said to Mouse, and had to stop to cough, only partially from the smoke—it wasn’t blowing towards him, but it was an additional irritant all the same. His throat hadn’t been bleeding when he’d woken up, but it was reminding him he’d been making a lot of noise, and he didn’t want to waste a potion on a sore throat and some leftover bruises.

 _I’m going to need to find some more drowners,_ he thought as he drank from his waterskin. The bonfire was much too hot to get close and try to snag any limbs to use as drowner bait, but he could head back along the river and hopefully run into a couple of the fishy bastards, and maybe some fresh celandine.

 _Speaking of bait—_ He was sitting right next to a relatively trash-free part of the Sansretour, and he had more than enough strong twine and bits of wire to fish for his supper.

Aiden had a small collection of fish by the time the sun had set. He gutted the fish and offered the entrails to Mouse, who sniffed them suspiciously but eventually deigned to eat the lot after a bit of coaxing. Those disposed of, he checked the pan he’d taken from the bandit’s stores to make sure it was hot enough on the small cooking fire he’d built, stuffed the body cavities of the fish with some herbs, and slid them into the pan to cook.

His medallion buzzed immediately after he cleaned his hands off, of course. “Is this a reasonable time?” came Artorius’ voice.

Aiden bit his tongue and dug out the fucking xenovox.

“Kikimores are all dead. Couple of vampires wanted the area.”

“Oh?” the mage asked. “I wouldn’t have thought they would be usual competition.”

“They aren’t,” Aiden said, trying to keep it as short as he could, partially in the interest of not straining his throat further. “Two bruxae and an alp, with some human minions. I think they were trying to make it look like the nest was still there so they could lure knights to the area to rob and eat.”

Artorius hummed thoughtfully. “Well, I suppose a queen’s major nerve was a long shot.”

“I have it,” Aiden said automatically. “I think they’d only just moved in, decay hadn’t really set in yet. I’d test it before doing anything with it, but—” he had to cut off and cough.

“Are you all right?” the mage asked, sounding slightly alarmed.

“Just a sore throat,” Aiden gritted. “Be fine tomorrow.”

“By Melitele, what from?”

Aiden had to force his fists to relax. “Went berserk,” he said. “I’m fine.”

“Went— what _happened?_ ”

_“Lillit’s **tits** , Aiden, I could have killed you if I hadn’t—! You didn’t think to tell me that was something that could fucking **happen?!** ”_

“Human blindsided me. I’m fine, horse is alive, nobody’s dead who shouldn’t be. It’s fine.”

“ _Aiden!_ ” the mage said. Aiden clenched his jaw shut to keep from saying something snippy. “I— are you _sure_ you’re all right?”

_“Fucking— What do you **mean** it happens when you’re ‘about to die’?! You mean to tell me that—”_

“Yes,” Aiden said, trying to cut the conversation off. He really didn’t want to be thinking of Lambert during a conversation with Artorius, and the fastest way to fix that was to get the mage to _stop talking_.

“I could portal in if you need—”

“It’s just bruising and a sore throat,” Aiden said, more than a little alarmed. “I swear, I am _fine_. I have food, more Swallow if I need it, and I’m not moving until tomorrow.” He was rasping, he knew, but he did _not_ want to see Artorius again so soon if he could help it.

There was a long moment of silence.

“I’ll keep an ear out overnight. Let me know if you need anything from me,” Artorius said finally.

“Understood,” Aiden said, trying not to sound ungrateful.

“I’ll speak with you again in three days, or sooner if you need me,” Artorius reminded him, and went silent. 

Aiden waited a solid minute, just to be sure he was gone, then seized an extra pair of socks from his saddlebags and muffled the fucking xenovox as swiftly and silently as he could. He wanted desperately to hurl the godsdamn thing into the Sansretour, but instead he stuffed it into the very bottom of his bags and very carefully did not scream out loud. A popping noise from the pan reminded him of the fish, and he took a deep breath and went to turn them over.

* * *

The bonfire burned itself out near dawn. Aiden smashed the blackened bones and scorched bits of exoskeleton with Aard and made sure there weren’t any live coals among the ashes before packing up and heading south along the river. 

Aiden happened upon some drowners quickly enough and dispatched them without any particular trouble, then stripped off his gauntlets and harvested enough brain tissue for quite a lot more Swallow. He piled the corpses on a clear part of the bank and set them burning. They were far enough away from anything that might catch that he felt fine continuing on and letting the fire burn out on its own.

Aiden dug out the other contracts from the Camerlengo as he rode. Seven of them were left; two archespore colonies, one that could be a vampire or could be a couple of foglets, one slyzard or other draconid, one concentration of barghests, a shaelmaar, and some scurvers near what had been an unlicensed animal slaughterhouse. 

“Time to get to work,” he muttered, and started planning his route. He’d need to cross Plegmund’s Bridge and check near the swamp for the vampire or foglets, and he could stop at the Coronata Vinyard for a couple of cases of their wine, as ordered, and make a rough circuit around the whole of Toussaint, killing monsters and buying more wine along the way.

Things near Coronata went more or less to expectations. The swamp had held an alp and a garkain, neither of which had given Aiden too much trouble. He had been mildly surprised that it _was_ vampires and not necrophages, but in his defense, necrophages were depressingly common in the north.

After he’d taken care of the vampires, he went to run the mage’s _errand_ , and wound up drinking with a man in the ‘actual’ Coronata tasting rooms (or so claimed the red-nosed farmer who had pulled him aside). Aiden thought he might have been telling the truth, at least as far as this _cave_ being the spot for the people who tended vines compared wines. Aiden was actually enjoying himself—he had money to spend, and the farmer was prepared to take it, regardless of minor considerations like Aiden’s being a scarred-up mutant. It was quite refreshing, honestly, and more than a little surprising. Aiden might have been suspicious that the man was trying to get him drunk, but he was matching Aiden glass-for-glass, and so was much further along than Aiden was.

“Probably for the best a mage’ll be picking up. Shipping north’s become a right pain in the ass,” the farmer said, taking another drink.

“Oh?” Aiden asked, although he suspected he knew why.

“A hanse’s dug into the ruins of the palace in the north, on the trade road,” the farmer said. “One day there were mutterin’ from Beauclair about refurbishing the place, and the next some fool bandit calling himself ‘Starling’ and his hangers-on are attacking everyone who comes through that road. Why the Duchessa hasn’t gathered her knights and army to give them a good sound beating, I don’t know.”

“Ahhh,” Aiden said, with genuine sympathy. “That’s a bad situation, and one that will only get worse if nothing’s done about it.”

“That it is,” the man said, then fixed Aiden with a curious eye. “You wouldn’t happen to be one of the sort that kills bandits, would ya…?”

Aiden winced, only exaggerating slightly. “I’m afraid there’s too many of them for even a Witcher. They had reports in the Camerlengo’s office, and even the least-generous estimate of men— well.” He kept a careful eye on the farmer, in case the news upset him.

“Ah, well,” the man said. “Couldn’t help but ask. I suppose we’ll keep sending people to complain, until the knights get up off their asses and do something about it.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Aiden said, and cheered the farmer.

Aiden emerged from the dark cellar over an hour later and had to halt and immediately contract his pupils down to the merest slits. The late-afternoon sun was beaming _right_ into his face. The farmer laughed and gave him a friendly clap on the arm, and Aiden smiled wryly.

“I’ll have the cases put aside, and the mage can pick them up with the order name,” he said.

“Thank you,” Aiden said, trying to sound sincere. It wasn’t the farmer’s fault Artorius—

The farmer waved him on his way, and Aiden collected Mouse from the stable, flipping a coin to the stableboy as he led her out.

“I think I’m actually tipsy,” he said into her ear as he gave her a quick look over before he mounted. “Too bad I couldn’t stay there until dinner. I haven’t gotten drunk since—”

He had to stop there. He genuinely couldn’t remember how long it had been since he’d been properly drunk, though it had almost certainly— well, it had almost certainly been with Lambert. Before Karadin. Before Artorius.

“Fuck,” he muttered. 

He should probably make some time to get soused on this trip. The mage was probably expecting him to. Hell, the mage was probably expecting him to go whoring. The fact that Aiden’s stomach turned over even contemplating it— he _was_ capable of just being attracted to someone and deciding to have sex with them, but the thought of doing it while under the mage’s spells, because it was something the mage was expecting him to do—no. He’d find a cabaret and admire the workers and have a few drinks, and let Artorius think he’d done more, if the mage didn’t ask him directly. _Fuck_ , he hoped the mage didn’t ask him directly.

Mouse shook her mane and jolted Aiden out of his thoughts.

“You’re right, girl. It’s going to be a while either way. Let’s get a move on towards those archespores while we still have the light, huh?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of sex work and sex workers near the end; Aiden's contemplating Artorius' assumption that he'll go have sex with someone while in Toussaint, and is upset by the idea of having sex with someone while under the compulsion spells (not that they would have any significant impact on his actions, but the reminder of Artorius over his shoulder).
> 
> also, not a warning, but I mean _cave_ in this chapter as in what it means in French; ie, cellar.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! I'm moving cross-country this month, so writing may or may not be a little bit slower. Either way, we're getting close to the end of this story, and I'll do my best to get it finished off soon!
> 
> Some spoilers for one of the endings of Witcher 3 here.
> 
> (Also, I couldn't figure out a derogatory nickname for the Toussaintois that mapped like French -> frog does so I just wound up using that. Ah well.)

He’d had to use up the last of his Oriole with the two infestations of archespores, but that wasn’t exactly unexpected. The scurvers hadn’t been any trouble at all, comparatively, and he’d set up a good chokepoint for the barghests, and managed to shoot some big holes through the slyzard’s wings, which made that fight quite a bit simpler. The shaelmaar, though…

Aiden threw himself to the side as the beast hurtled towards him. Gods, he fucking hated the rare creature trade. And he hated shaelmaars. They had been one thing he hadn’t missed after the Cats had relocated north. 

He sprang out of the way once more as the armored monster lunged at him, trying to position himself near one of the _cave_ walls. The shaelmaar had already smashed most of the shelves and destroyed much of the wine, so there wasn't really any point in not trying for any advantage he could get. While he could appreciate Toussaint's fervor for the grape, there was a point where it got to be absolutely ridiculous, and that point was trying to insist he handicap himself and maybe get injured or killed to save bottles or barrels. 

People tended to generally misunderstand the point of Witchers anyway—while none of them (perhaps minus one particular _disgrace to the name_ ) _objected_ to saving lives or livelihoods, far too depressingly often all they could do was to come in and stop ongoing harm. They weren’t miracle-workers. They just killed monsters.

He had to stop navel-gazing and cast Quen to keep from being run over by the monster he was actually fighting, but he got in a few slices to the shaelmaar’s underbelly as it reeled from the backlash of the Quen breaking. Aard wouldn’t be enough to knock it over, but if he could trip it up on some of the wreckage or get it to smash into a wall—

He leaped over a chunk of pillar as the shaelmaar charged again and grinned fiercely when the monster fouled itself on the stone. Several more slashes finished the creature off, and Aiden dragged the body over to a more structurally sound part of the _cave_ to remove the head—and, by order of Artorius’ shopping list, parts of the carapace and hide.

The adrenaline rush faded as he was butchering and Aiden was left feeling kind of sick. The shaelmaar was the last of the stack of contracts he’d gotten from the Camerlengo, and the last time he’d been at Silas’ manor, the mage had made him sit still while he collected a number of tissue samples—he’d clearly reached the first stage of testing mutagens. Sooner or later that would come due, and Aiden would be locked in the mage’s basement being twisted by whatever decoctions he would cook up—

Aiden accidentally broke the piece of carapace he was holding.

“Shit,” he muttered. 

That wasn’t a great sign for his emotional control. Artorius would only buy lingering terror from the Trials for so long as an excuse for him being unhappy with the decision to mutate him further. What was more, Aiden couldn’t let him think that he would _stay_ unhappy about it, or that he might resent Artorius for it, not if he wanted to be able to keep the chance of the mage slipping up anytime soon.

_Gods. Let him slip up soon._

Aiden forcefully pulled his mind back to the job. He’d go turn in the contracts, and he’d get paid, and maybe he’d go get completely smashed at one of the taverns in Beauclair, and he wouldn’t think about what was coming until he had to.

* * *

The Camerlengo had been the kind of surprised that would have offended Lambert when Aiden returned with all the contracts marked completed by the nearest official, which in several cases had taken longer than the fights—Aiden had almost forgotten what bureaucracy was like—but Aiden refused to let it bother him. Thankfully, the purse stuffed full of florens definitely helped with that. Aiden weighed it in his hand as he meandered back to the slightly more upscale inn he’d gotten a room at. He paid the innkeep for a bath to be brought to his room—that he could reheat when he got back, there were some bonuses to being able to make fire shoot from your hands—and to keep an eye on his things, including most of the coin (hidden in his saddlebags), and headed out to get drunk.

Unfortunately, that was easier said than done; Aiden didn’t really want to be around a lot of noise and cheer, which disqualified most of the establishments that would serve a Witcher. He was getting a little desperate by the time he wandered almost into Lassommoir from Hauteville and spotted a quiet but fairly busy tavern just by the Nilfgaardian embassy. Aiden would have willingly downed some of Lambert’s worse distillations by now, so the threat of most Nilfgaardian concoctions wasn’t about to ward him off. Not to mention that using leaded vessels for food or drink had been banned across the Empire for—well, not thirty years straight, because the usurper had made it legal again, probably one of his backers had owned silver mines and wanted to re-open the market for lead cauldrons for making _defrutum_ and _sapa_ and for lead aqueduct pipes. But he wasn’t going to be risking heavy metal poisoning for going in and emptying a half a keg of whatever they would sell him.

Several people eyed him curiously when he walked in, but Aiden pretended he didn’t notice and headed for the bar. The proprietor gave him a slightly sneering look, but before he could say anything Aiden spoke up.

“I’m just looking for a quiet evening,” he said in Toussaintois, and put down a pouch of florens. 

The money and the language, along with Aiden’s best ‘I’m an idiot but a well-paying one’ smile, softened the man up enough that he let Aiden have a seat at the end of the bar, and provided him with a pitcher of wine and one of water, a clay cup, and a bowl of olives. Aiden gave the wine a cautious sniff, and was pleasantly surprised when it turned out to be—well, it wasn’t very high quality, but it had a relatively high alcohol content and had been mixed with a fair number of herbs in order to disguise the fact that it was only a couple of steps away from being used for vinegar. He’d drunk far worse, and not just because he had to.

For the moment he eschewed the water, and poured an entire cupful of the wine, downing it in one long pull. He finished three cups like that, just to get started on tipsiness as quickly as possible, then stopped to actually taste the next, alternating sips with olives. He’d probably order more food later on, once it wasn’t going to kill his buzz.

“Doesn’t even know he’s supposed to water his wine,” he heard someone down the bar mutter in Nilfgaardian.

Aiden was used to people having no idea what his hearing was like, or how many languages he knew, and continued drinking placidly.

“You already know these Toussaintois don’t drink like that,” someone else, probably the first speaker’s friend, said.

“Why’d he come _here_ , then, if he’s going to drink like a frog?” the first speaker continued.

“Don’t be a fool, Marcus, that’s a Witcher. You know these northerners have all sorts of wild tales about them,” the friend responded. “Probably none of the frog bars would let him in.”

Aiden had to bite his tongue to keep from snorting. It had been a long time since Witchers were truly common in the south, between the Cats abandoning Stygga and the decline of the Vipers and then sacking of their keep, Gorthur Gvaed. It was almost funny, imperial citizens not having any clue what monsters and the people who killed them were truly capable of.

“If they’re all drunkards, I hate to think of what the princess will be like,” the first man grumbled, and Aiden almost stopped dead.

“ _Marcus_ ,” the friend hissed.

“What, like not every citizen’s thinking it? Raised not just by northern barbarians, but by a cult like that? ”

“Marcus, that’s _treason_ ,” the friend said, so quietly that Aiden barely heard him. A sidelong glance showed him the man’s face had lost almost all color.

“Is it treason to not want some devil-worshipping foreigner sitting on the throne?” Marcus asked, but his voice, which had already been soft, went even softer. “Bad enough that she was spawned in the first place, but insisting she marry Voorhis and become Empress—”

Aiden leaned back slightly and looked around the room, letting his gaze slide over Marcus and his friend. The men both twitched, little flinches that probably nobody else would have noticed. Aiden set his gaze on some of the art painted on the walls and took another sip from his cup. 

_A princess raised by Witchers,_ he thought, careful not to let his expression change. _I only know of one. What the **fuck** has been happening since I was taken?_

He wasn’t going to get more information out of the two he’d been listening to, though. Not-Marcus left a small handful of coins on the counter and chivvied Marcus out into the street—not a bad idea for their personal safety. His own annoyance aside, Nilfgaard was very touchy about treasonous talk, rather understandably given they’d had two rulers overthrown inside a single generation. He took another drink and a couple of deep breaths. There was more chatter to listen in on.

By the time he left, he’d gone through five pitchers of wine, all of the olives, a shallow dish of tapenade and bread to spread it on, and had _slightly_ more of an idea of what the fuck had been happening in the world while he’d been locked in a basement. Nilfgaard was, reportedly, poised to conquer the North, and there was no one left to stop them. No one else was talking about the Nilfgaardian princess or about Witchers, which had been frustrating in the extreme. He was only middling drunk, too, having been too distracted by information-gathering to really dedicate himself to complete intoxication. All in all, a disappointing evening so far.

Aiden couldn’t help wandering through Beauclair, taking in the buildings and plants, the sights and the scents and the sounds of the city. Like this, with none of his belongings carrying the lingering scent of the mage or his home, without the compulsion spells riding him to move onto the next task, he could pretend. He could pretend that he was free, just for tonight.

* * *

“Ah, Gib, you’ve done a _wonderful_ job,” Artorius said the next day in Silas’ tower, cupping Aiden’s face.

Aiden kept his breath long and steady and let his mind focus on that like he was meditating rather than try to react to that sentence and end up screaming. 

“I have a note for payment, stamped with Silas’ seal,” the mage continued. “You go collect from his majordomo and I’ll set up a tragic accident to happen in a few days. I’ll make a portal for you once I’m done with that here.”

Aiden nodded, and took the letter Artorius handed him. The sum named wasn’t quite high enough that the majordomo wouldn’t have it on hand to provide, but it would definitely eat a huge chunk out of the manor’s cashbox. With Silas’ death, it was probable that the manor staff would disperse to find another paying job, rather than hang around until a buyer for the property could be found or funds from the ducal treasury approved to keep them present until a sale could be arranged—which would also mean that it would be difficult to find and interview the servants about what might have caused their master’s death. Aiden turned and headed down to present the letter to the majordomo.

He was only about two hours out when the fucking xenovox picked up.

“I’m done here, Gib,” the mage said. “Break a token for me and I’ll come pick you up.”

Aiden did as he was bidden, his fingers leaden. There wasn’t any point in resisting. This was going to happen, and he was going to have to figure out how to deal with it.

There was a bit of a song and dance getting Aiden back into Artorius’ labs and Mouse back into his stables without anyone seeing them, but it resolved itself rapidly enough. Aiden let the saddlebags slide off his shoulders as he stared at the hellishly familiar space, smelled the scents that were imprinted onto his damn brain. A month he’d been gone, and his heart was sinking into his feet at the irrefutable evidence that he was just as trapped as he had been before.

“Good to be home, hm?” Artorius asked, and Aiden choked back a disbelieving laugh.

“When is it not?” he asked in return, trying to inject some emotion into his voice.

Artorius clapped his shoulder and Aiden forced himself to not flinch.

“I’m sure you want some rest,” the mage said. “I’ll have a bath ready with your supper.”

Aiden nodded and walked into his cage and stipped off his armor, the swords, the clothes he’d been wearing, and laid down in the bed, facing towards the wall and curling into a ball. The medallion he was wearing hummed, and he twitched as he felt the compulsion spells lift. They’d been on him 24/7 the whole time he was in Toussaint—and he was appalled to realize that without their weight on him, he was starting to cry.

He couldn’t let the mage see this. He pulled the covers up and over his head, and tried not to shake apart completely.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Halloween, everybody! I have completed my move and am now running around unpacking and doing a bunch of other things that need doing. Nonetheless, I swore to myself I would post _something_ on this day, and I'm quite pleased that it's this. Poor Aiden. :D
> 
> Check the end notes for a couple of warnings!

Aiden hadn’t actually managed to snap himself out of his funk—the mage spent too much time taking samples from him and talking excitedly about what he might be able to achieve for Aiden to manage to shove everything into a mental box—but he _did_ manage to disguise it and to wear off some of his nervous energy by spending more time on sword forms and strength training. It was almost funny—sometimes he was literally climbing the walls of his cage with it.

The sameness of the days made time start to blur, though the monotony was interspersed with spikes of anxiety when Artorius made progress or had a spectacular failure. Aiden _knew_ that the mage wasn’t going to slip up and facilitate Aiden’s escape when he was so busy that Aiden sometimes went days without seeing him for more than a moment or two, but each sign that the mage was moving towards a workable set of mutagens stressed him out further.

Aiden was doing one of the more ridiculous things he’d come up with, having hooked his legs through the bars at the top of his cage and started doing sit-ups while hanging there, trying simultaneously to read a treatise on draconids, when the mage came in.

He looked at Aiden and his lips twitched. Aiden squashed some reflexive annoyance—he probably did look funny, hanging upside-down like he was—and freed his legs so that he could drop to the ground.

“I need to take a few more samples,” the mage said, and Aiden felt the spells take hold.

_Joy. More chunks carved out of me,_ he couldn’t help thinking as he walked into the room with the table. He closed his eyes as the mage put the needle into his arm; he didn’t need to see this.

When sensation returned, he was itching in the way that meant a dose of Swallow had healed over the cuts the mage had made, and something was combing through his hair. It felt more ticklish than Artorius petting him usually did, though, and his alarm level ticked up a notch when he heard the mage speak from far enough away that it couldn’t be him.

“Do refrain from panicking, Gib,” he said, and Aiden took a deep breath.

“What’s—” he asked, as the tickling sensation continued.

“I allowed some of the scolopendromorph eggs to hatch, so I could let the creatures mate and procure additional eggs if I needed to,” the mage said, and Aiden’s blood went cold. “One managed to get out of the terrarium about an hour ago and seems to have taken quite a liking to you. I was watching it the whole time, and it’s not made any attempt to harm you—I would have stopped it if it had.”

Aiden supposed that was true enough—at the very least he didn’t feel the burning sensation that he would have if the centipede had bitten him. Still. He had a _giant centipede_ crawling on his _head._ Baby or not, that was _not_ a situation he wanted to be in.

“Can you please get it off,” he said, already knowing the mage probably wouldn’t.

“Are you that interested in getting back to what you were doing?” the mage asked, amused.

Aiden bit his tongue for a moment and said, haltingly, “Not really.”

The mage raised an eyebrow and Aiden sighed, trying to look resigned rather than angry.

“Can you please bring me my book, then?” he asked.

“That I can do,” the mage said, and got up.

Aiden focused on not twitching too hard as the centipede continued exploring his hair, and propped the book on his chest and continued trying to read after the mage handed it to him. The centipede eventually seemed to decide it wanted to explore new territory, and stretched out from just above his ear to reach his shoulder to scuttle around on his bare chest. Aiden kept getting distracted, watching it.

It truly didn’t seem inclined to try to hurt him, refraining even when it started climbing up the inside of his arm and he flinched so hard at the sensation it nearly fell. Aiden wasn’t precisely ticklish, but something dangerous and unpredictable trailing over a very vulnerable spot was— well. Deeply unpleasant.

The centipede finished the climb up to the top of his arm and started across the spread top of the book, investigating the open pages. Aiden, now deprived of the ability to actually read, started a closer inspection of the centipede. It was almost as long as his forearm, though, small mercies, not nearly as wide. Unlike the adults, the baby was almost completely white, tinting to a bluish gray along the back. It was possible that the back would darken further as the insectoid grew, but Aiden hadn’t ever run into pale widows before, much less their spawn, so he didn’t know for certain. He idly counted legs, coming up with thirty-nine pairs, four less than he was used to seeing on giant centipedes.

_Three sets of thirteen,_ Aiden thought. _Wonder if that’s significant somehow._

The mage sat and tinkered while Aiden watched the centipede. Aiden was still half-expecting it to attack him when he least expected it when the mage spoke.

“I’ll have to continue to indulge my curiosity on a different day,” Artorius said, and the centipede froze, a slight shimmer in the air outlining it. “Perhaps I’ll procure a separate terrarium for it.”

Aiden refrained from commenting on how little he wanted yet another thing he’d have to walk on eggshells around, and stood when the mage removed the centipede. He returned to his cage without speaking, and waited until he was sure Artorius had left the labs before he laid into the training dummy in the corner, completely unarmed. His knuckles were split and he’d hit it hard enough to bruise his elbows and legs by the time he was done, but he’d worn himself out enough that he could get to sleep.

* * *

Several days or possibly a week later, Aiden heard a crash from the lab and immediately sat up. He hadn’t heard anything like that since early in the mage’s attempts to create eyes for him. Tentative hope rose; if Artorius was having that much trouble, more mutations might be further off than he’d thought. Anything that would put them off—

Artorius came storming into the room and started pacing while muttering furiously to himself. Aiden stayed frozen still, torn between wanting to know what had the mage so agitated and wanting absolutely nothing to do with it. Unfortunately, he didn’t get to decide, as the mage turned on his heel again and strode over to the cage. The fevered look on his face seemed almost distressed.

“I can’t make the decoctions work properly if the anesthetic is present in a tissue sample,” Artorius said to him without preamble.

“What?” Aiden was startled into saying.

“The mutagens have an adverse interaction with the anesthetic I have that works on you,” Artorius said. “I can’t find a way to work around it, and I don’t have any potential replacements.”

Aiden was at a bit of a loss for words. He hadn’t really thought that the mage would be looking for a way to completely spare him the pain of new mutations. The Trials had been so overwhelmingly painful, he’d taken it as a given that whatever Artorius would do to him would cause him agony as well, even if the mage provided painkillers afterwards.

“Gib?” the mage asked. “I’ll still do everything I can. I’m trying to get hold of some hookweed extract. I know it’s not a proper anesthetic, but it’s notoriously low-interaction.”

“I didn’t think you were going to give me anything,” Aiden said before he could stop himself.

“Aiden!” the mage said, shocked and maybe a little offended. “Why would you possibly think that I wouldn’t try to anesthetize you before this?”

“They didn’t the first time,” fell out of Aiden’s mouth.

Artorius’ expression went grim. “Yes. I was of the opinion that they were fools, but I’m beginning to see the reasoning behind it.”

A chill went up Aiden’s spine at that.

“I swear to you, I will make _certain_ you are in as little pain as possible,” Artorius continued, and Aiden bit down on his tongue rather than tell the mage that the way to do that would be to set him free.

Artorius sighed and ran a hand through his hair after a few moments of Aiden not responding, then turned back towards his lab. Aiden frowned as the mage halted to open the door; he heard a sound coming from the other room, one that didn’t fit with the usual noises of the lab.

“Ah,” Artorius exclaimed. “I see we have an escape artist in our midst.”

Aiden craned his neck and caught a glimpse of— the baby giant centipede. Of course. He watched as the mage backed out of the doorway and the centipede skittered in. Artorius was smiling, as if he didn’t care that he was letting a dangerous creature wander around his space completely unrestrained.

_Why couldn’t he be so incautious with **me?**_ Aiden wondered crossly.

“I wonder if it will still be interested in you,” Artorius said, and sat down at one of the tables in the room.

_At least he’s not going right back to the mutagens,_ Aiden told himself as he watched the insectoid explore the room. He watched the centipede come closer and closer with a growing sense of inevitability, and eventually let it climb up his boot and leg without protest, though he steered it away from his crotch. He wasn’t completely insane.

Artorius was clearly hiding a smile when Aiden looked over to him.

“Is this the first time this has happened?” he asked, amused.

“ _Yes_ ,” Aiden said. It _was_ the first time it had happened with a centipede, anyway. The days-old wolf pup that had decided he was her mama some forty years back did _not_ count. He didn’t want to tell the mage about that— not about Iris herself, not about the way the other Cats had teased him about picking up a second wolf when he’d become friends with Lambert. He wouldn’t let the mage poke around in those memories if he could help it.

“It must be at least a little boring, what with me spending most of my time in the lab,” the mage observed. “Perhaps it could keep you company.”

Aiden stifled a groan.

* * *

More time passed. Aiden practiced and read and took observational notes on the baby pale widow, which had been moved into his space in a more secure terrarium than the one it had been escaping from. It was better than spending all of his time fretting, at least, though he was going to make a concentrated effort to _not_ wind up like the poor soul who had penned _The So-Called Giant Centipedes, or My Only Comfort in Exile_. 

He’d woken up a couple of hours ago and had been going through sword forms when the door burst open and the mage rushed over to him. Aiden turned to face him, halfway wondering if there was some emergency the mage needed him for.

“I have it,” Artorius said, his eyes burning. The words smashed into Aiden’s head like a physical blow.

_Please, no,_ Aiden couldn’t help thinking, reflexive even after his whole lifetime of experience. _Not yet._

“Ah, so grim-faced, Gib,” Artorius said. “This really won’t be nearly as unpleasant as your Trials, I’ve told you.”

Aiden inclined his head slightly. It was _better_ to let the mage make assumptions. He needed to remember that. He _needed_ to remember that. 

“Water or broth only for the next eight hours,” Artorius said. “Don’t want you aspirating partially-digested food if you vomit.”

_Lovely,_ Aiden thought sarcastically. _Unwanted mutations **and** no real food._

The day somehow passed at a crawl and a sprint simultaneously. Aiden almost couldn’t believe that this was going to happen _today_ , but the memories of the torture he’d undergone during his Trials refused to leave his mind.

By the time the mage came back in what must have been late afternoon, Aiden was ready to kill something. The spells fell on his head, and he almost welcomed them; it made not resisting easier by far. He couldn’t burn what trust he’d gained by fighting something the mage was bound and determined to do to him regardless of his willingness. He followed the mage into the operating room, trying to embrace blank numbness instead of sheer panic, with only middling success. 

“Strip, Gib, then lie down on the table for me,” Artorius said, brushing a hand against his cheekbone. 

Aiden eyed the table as he undressed, which had been outfitted with heavy leather straps lined with fleece padding, and an additional thick pad of fleece where his head would rest. He wasn’t sure if the mage expected him to not ruin the restraints with various fluids or if he was just planning to burn them afterwards and purchase new if he needed more—it really could be either, though if it was the second Aiden wasn’t looking forward to picking fuzz out of his wounds.

When he’d placed his clothes out of the way, he reluctantly climbed onto the surface and clenched his jaw as the mage started to restrain him. Aiden grayed out slightly at the feel of the straps, at the mage adjusting the position of his head, the nightmare of the Trials rising behind his eyes and swallowing him whole, instead of chewing him up and spitting him out. He was so lost in memories he barely even felt the burning sensation that began in his arm. The feeling spread gradually, blood heating until it scorched his veins and burned him from head to toe. He was too tightly tied to thrash, but he flexed all the same, certain that this was only the prelude to melting into nothingness.

“—Aiden!” he heard someone say, but the voice didn’t matter. The Trials had him, and he would live or die on pure chance, and there was nothing he could do to halt it.

He didn’t have any real sense of time, but he became aware that something was wrong nonetheless—he hurt, badly, but he was capable of recognizing that and thinking about it, which just didn’t seem right. The last time—

_There had been a last time?_ Aiden thought before he washed away on a fresh tide of pain, his insides twisting in ways they surely weren’t supposed to.

Aiden bobbed in and out of lucidity like a drowning man—never above surface long enough to do anything about his situation, only able to realize that he wasn’t dead yet. He wasn’t sure how long he floated there, halfway out of his mind with pain on the mage’s operating table, before slowly surfacing. He became aware that the pain he was feeling was greatly lessened, and elected to just breathe for a while.

“Back with us, Gib?” the mage asked in an odd tone.

Aiden couldn’t help twitching. He hadn’t registered that anyone else was in the room, too focused on the way his everything was throbbing in mild agony. He didn’t move that much; clearly he was still wrapped in the restraints. There was a little more give to them than he remembered though. Aiden cracked an eye open and adjusted the pupil until he could make out the room, then opened the other one in surprise at seeing how far he had stretched the straps.

“You were in a great deal of distress,” the mage said quietly. 

Aiden managed a grunt. That sounded pretty accurate. He hadn’t been expecting to slide into flashbacks to the Trials, but he had, and that had fed a lot of his _distress_ , as Artorius wanted to call it.

“I have analgesics, if you desire,” the mage said, still very subdued, and part of Aiden’s brain turned over and started paying attention. Artorius sounded—concerned?

Aiden licked his lips and opened his mouth, only for a croak to emerge. He heard a muttered curse from Artorius, and after a few moments a wet cloth was pressed to his mouth. Aiden accepted the moisture greedily—even though the mage had undoubtedly given him fluids intravenously, his throat was rough, probably from screaming.

“‘S not too bad,” he managed, after a little while and more water. He wasn’t particularly enamored with the idea of Artorius putting even _more_ substances into him, and he wasn’t even lying about the pain. It _wasn’t_ nearly as bad as he’d felt after the Trials, though it was roughly equal to the one time he’d been bowled over the edge of a mountain by a troll and rolled halfway down before he came to a halt. Definitely on the serious side, but only about two thirds of the way to the worst he’d ever felt.

Artorius just undid all the restraints and started running his fingers through Aiden’s hair after hearing that, his eyes wide and— worried? A couple of things clicked into place in Aiden’s brain. 

“Are you sure?” the mage asked, and yep that was guilt in his tone. Artorius hadn’t expected to hurt Aiden as badly as he had, maybe.

“‘M sure,” Aiden croaked, and watched Artorius’ eyes tighten at it.

“Very well,” the mage said, and continued petting Aiden. 

Aiden actually managed to doze for a little while. He still felt like hammered shit when he woke up again, but he was able to stumble into his actual bed with some help from the mage, and fell into a deeper sleep listening to the centipede moving around in its terrarium, too exhausted to worry about what had been done to him tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for insects, specifically (real life sized) giant centipedes, description of and crawling on someone, and a general note that Aiden starts having flashbacks to his Trials, though it's pretty vague.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there everyone! We're getting close to the end of this thing—just one more chapter, if I've estimated correctly.
> 
> Thanks again to Laurelnose, this time for for his posts about common names of monsters (and for all the art he's done!)
> 
> Check the end notes for some warnings, I do mean that new Body Horror tag.

Aiden spent what seemed like a long time mostly unconscious. The mage woke him every so often to feed him and pet his hair and ask how he was feeling (usually ‘in agony’). He’d almost forgotten how bad he’d felt after his Trials, but this was bringing it roaring back, in full and torturous detail. When he was capable of staying awake for more than fifteen minutes at a stretch, Artorius started giving him a painkiller. After that— well, he still hurt when he was awake, but he was too doped out of his mind to really care. Aiden spent a lot of time staring at the pale widow nymph in its terrarium. He wasn’t really together enough to worry about it getting out, and at least it was something different to watch— and to listen to. He could hear the skittering of its legs when things were quiet.

Clawing his way back towards little things like being ambulatory felt like they took forever, even compared to his memories of recovery after the Trials. Of course, the fact that he was alternately unconscious or stuffed to the gills with painkillers meant his sense of time passing was even worse than usual.

“Guess kids bounce back faster,” he mumbled to himself after one particularly humiliating attempt to sit up on his own. He hadn’t even been able to support himself on his arms, and all the muscles he’d been trying to use burned like he’d just come off a dose of Thunderbolt.

“Gib?” the mage said, and Aiden flinched. He hadn’t even heard the man come in, he'd been so focused on his attempt—and given that lately he'd been hearing the mage opening the door to the passages into the elven ruins, that was _really_ saying something.

“Did you need something?” Artorius continued.

Aiden shook his head. 

“Testing,” he grunted when the mage continued to look at him worriedly.

“I don’t want you to hurt yourself trying to do things before you’ve recovered,” the mage said. 

Aiden fixed him with a stare, glad that he was so exhausted. There were far too many angry responses bouncing around in his head, but the overwhelming desire to fall back asleep made it easier to not say any of them.

* * *

Aiden was staying awake for probably eight hours a stretch when his teeth started falling out. He’d been eating some soft, fragrant cheese Artorius had left him when he felt a crack around his jaw, and pulled the mouthful back out to find his upper right canine stuck in it.

Aiden pulled the tooth loose and gave it a closer look. It wasn’t worn enough for it to have been part of the regular cycle of his body to shed and grow a new one, but the roots were almost completely dissolved, which meant it probably wasn’t some kind of damage to it that had led to it coming out either. He probed at the gum where it had been, and found there was definitely another tooth growing in—a damn sharp one too, he realized as he cut his tongue on it.

Aiden stuck the old canine in the bedside table and finished his food before going back to sleep. Artorius, however, wasn’t nearly as unconcerned.

“Fuck,” Aiden muttered, some time later, spitting out another canine and a bicuspid.

“ _Aiden?_ ” Artorius said, stopping running his fingers through Aiden’s hair and along his face.

“‘M growing new,” Aiden said, half-heartedly scowling at the teeth in his hand and the sour waft of panic off the mage.

“I—” Artorius said, and it occurred to Aiden that, as far as he knew, the mage hadn’t ever seen him grow in new teeth.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” the mage asked.

“No,” Aiden said, and forced himself to explain further before the mage did. “No good reason why these are coming out. But new ones’re growing in, so— worry when there’s something to worry about.”

That didn’t get him out of the mage poking around in his mouth for way too long, but at least he’d kept the topic specifically on his teeth, instead of his hatred of his overall situation.

Artorius eventually concluded that there wasn’t anything to be done in the moment—which Aiden couldn’t even feel vindicated about, given the impromptu dentistry session _still_ hadn’t gotten the mage’s hands off his face—and went to work at the table in the room with the cage, so worried that Aiden could smell it from his bed. Aiden had gone back to sleep.

Indifferent as Aiden’s attitude was, he felt a chill when he realized he was growing in a double set of canines to replace the ones he’d lost. Inhuman regrowth of teeth aside, every Witcher he’d known in person had had what could fairly reasonably be called human dentition, even if there were a few oddities here and there, like Lambert’s (adorable) oversized canine. A whole extra set of canines was _not_ a usual difference.

 _They definitely aren’t from the centipede,_ Aiden thought, watching the pale widow skitter around its enclosure and running his tongue over his new teeth. _Could maybe be from a vampire, but I don’t think this matches any of the ways their teeth are set—_

Of course, Aiden had no fucking idea what particular monster bits Artorius had used to mutate him. He'd probably have better luck figuring out where the new layout of his mouth came from just by comparing bite patterns.

He was trying to remember the differences between forktail and slyzard bites when Artorius came in. There was, inevitably, a lot more poking around in his mouth.

“I _believe_ your jaw has expanded,” Artorius said finally, sitting back. “Which argues that you’re growing in extra teeth, instead of these new cuspids replacing a set of incisors or bicuspids. I can’t imagine that your jawbone changing shape in such a comparatively short amount of time would be something that you wouldn’t notice, however—”

“Hasn’t hurt more than anything else,” Aiden said tiredly, and got another horrified look from Artorius. He had to wonder just how delusional the mage was, if he’d expected this whole fiasco to be anything but tortuously painful to Aiden. Artorius had access to him, and he couldn’t lie if directly questioned; the mage acting like he’d had no idea what he had condemned Aiden to was— _insulting,_ albeit entirely in-character. 

Aiden wasn’t about to say that, though, so he just let his head fall to the side and went back to looking at the baby giant centipede. He thought Artorius might have just fed it; it was cleaning itself meticulously, the way it always did after devouring whatever food the mage dropped in.

 _Fuck,_ he wanted a real bath. The mage had been doing what he could with cloths, but Aiden still felt like he was marinated in the sickly, acrid scent of his own sweat.

 _When I can sit upright for an hour or two,_ he thought. _I’ll suck it up and ask._

“Is there food somewhere?” he asked aloud. The gnawing pit of his stomach wasn’t quite in full swing, but he’d rather eat now instead of waiting until he got so hungry it woke him up.

“Ah, of course,” Artorius said.

* * *

Aiden did get his bath eventually, after he’d lost and mostly regrown every one of his teeth. The mage confirmed that he’d grown in two more than he’d had previously in the process, though he didn’t seem to have any idea what might have caused it either. Aiden still had a throbbing ache going in every muscle, joint, and bone, but he could stay upright for long enough that he wasn’t about to drown in the washtub. He was even alone for the moment, Artorius having left him to soak with instructions to call when he needed his hair taken care of. Aiden was, of course, putting that off for as long as he could.

When the water started getting cold, he cast Igni to reheat it and yelped in pain as the temperature shot to _way too fucking hot_. By the time Artorius burst into the room, giving off the stench of panic, Aiden was lying bewildered on the flagstones, having flailed his way out of the tub and slopped half the water onto the floor in the process.

“What happened?” Artorius asked frantically.

Aiden blinked up at him in confusion for a moment before the compulsion spells pried his mouth open. 

“I— Sign was much more powerful than I…” he trailed off in embarrassment.

“Sign?” Artorius said, brow furrowing. “Why would you be—”

Aiden half-wished the floor would just swallow him when the mage got it and started laughing.

“Ah, Gib, I’m sorry,” the mage said after a minute, wiping his eyes. “You’re not hurt, are you?”

“No more than I was already,” Aiden grumbled. He’d banged his elbow and knee and bit his tongue when he’d hit the floor, and he was cold and sore again, but he wasn’t burned or bleeding too badly.

“Since I’m here, how about I take care of your hair?” Artorius said, lips twitching, as he refilled the tub and heated the water again with a couple of spells.

Aiden nodded resignedly and let Artorius help haul him to his feet and pour him back into the tub. His skin started crawling as the mage dug lavender-soap-covered fingers into Aiden’s hair, but the tiny shiver he couldn’t suppress would be easy enough to read as appreciation, since he forced himself to lean into the touch.

“Do you know what happened?” Artorius asked as he scrubbed. “Mechanically, I mean.”

Aiden frowned and tried to concentrate on what had gone wrong. “I wasn’t doing anything I hadn’t done before,” he said. “I didn’t feed any more power into it than usual— or, I don’t think I did.”

“If you feel up to doing it again, I could measure that,” Artorius said. “You needn’t use it to try and heat the water, you’d only need to cast it again,” he added after Aiden winced.

Aiden thought for a moment, but he wanted to know what had happened too, much as he hated to let Artorius dig into it. He cast Igni at the wet stone floor and blinked as the puddles immediately hissed and turned into clouds of steam.

“Hm,” Artorius said, voice distant with concentration. “No, I don’t think you’re using more power, but there’s greater force behind the Sign all the same. Good.”

Aiden looked up and saw that awful light burning in the mage’s eyes. Clearly this was a hoped-for outcome. He kept silent through the rest of the wash, trim, and shave, and tried not to lean too hard on Artorius as the mage helped him back into his (freshly-laundered) bed. There was more food waiting, but Aiden didn’t touch it. He didn’t think he’d be able to force it down.

* * *

Aiden almost wanted to cheer when he could _finally_ get up and exercise. He only got in a couple of push-ups before he had to lay flat on the floor and breathe for a while, but at least he could _do_ them. After staring into space or reading until his vision blurred or being flat asleep for the last— whatever it was, anyway— the prospect of actually getting to be active again was downright exciting. He _still_ ached down through his bones, but he’d mostly gotten used to it. Artorius kept making noises about painkillers, but Aiden had turned him down flat ever since the pain had faded enough to be livable. He barely even noticed it now.

In truth, the ache reminded him of his growing spurt, when he’d been putting on muscle and bone density as his body changed into a full Witcher’s. He tried not to think too much about how it was probably the exact same thing, or what it meant that it had started out feeling so much worse. He let his gaze wander over to the pale widow nymph as he waited for the shakiness in his arms to fade. It was exploring the edges of the glass, probably trying to figure out how to get loose. Whatever Artorius had done with the smaller tank, it had kept Aiden from waking up to the centipede crawling on him, which he was grateful for but also made him feel slightly guilty.

“You and me both,” he said to it, subvocally.

Aiden grimly lifted himself back into position and did a couple more push-ups, gritting his teeth and staring fixedly at the baby centipede as his arms started burning unpleasantly. When they outright refused to support him any longer he turned onto his back and started doing sit-ups. The sooner he got back into routine— the sooner he could do something other than just lie there like a lump— the sooner he could take advantage if the mage gave him a chance.

Aiden woke the next morning and whimpered. He’d overdone it, by _much_ too much. All of his muscles were burning like they’d been lit up with Igni, and trying to turn over added the sensation of glass shards entwined with the fibers grinding in as they flexed. He gave up on trying to move and lay there in sheer misery until the mage came in with breakfast.

“Gib? What’s wrong?” Artorius asked, some indeterminate but _fucking lengthy_ amount of time later.

“Overdid it. Hurts,” Aiden gritted out.

Artorius sighed. “May I offer analgesics? Or at least another bath?”

Aiden caved. “Both. Please.”

“...I’m going to make sure you haven’t seriously damaged yourself,” Artorius said after a moment, running a fingertip along Aiden’s clenched jaw.

Aiden couldn’t bring himself to respond, but he also couldn’t help but think that it was probably a good idea. The painkillers and the bath helped, and Arorius proclaimed him only temporarily incapacitated.

“Do I need to instruct you to not overdo it like this again?” the mage asked, so patronizing that Aiden wanted to vomit. He _smelled_ smug.

“No,” Aiden said.

“Good,” Artorius said, punctuating the word with a tap to Aiden’s forehead. “Can you sit up to eat?”

Aiden hauled himself upright, resigned to the still-monumental demands of his appetite.

After he’d recovered from his stupidity, he took strength-building in stages. It was maddening to only be able to work out for a fraction of the time he’d been able to previously and then have to retire to the chair or bed and do nothing for the rest of the day. He couldn’t even sleep the days away like he could earlier on—he wanted something to _do_. Books could only do so much.

Eventually, out of sheer boredom, he started letting the centipede out.

He was well aware that this might be the stupidest decision he’d made yet, but as much as getting envenomated by the thing would hurt, it wasn’t at all likely to kill him unless he sat there and let it get him multiple times— and he could move well enough now that there was no real chance of that. In any case, the baby pale widow _still_ seemed to view him mostly as an attractive and exciting obstacle course; it would crawl all over him by preference, but didn’t exhibit any interest in trying to attack him. He had to wonder if it was damaged somehow (despite the expected viciousness with which it went after other prey) or, probably more likely, if Artorius had done something to it.

Damn shame. If Artorius was the cause of the behavior, it wasn’t particularly likely that the centipede would decide to attack _him._ Not with how carefully he kept Aiden from being able to harm him.

"I think it's time I pick up a sword again," he said to the centipede. "You have any thoughts?"

The pale widow nymph reared up onto its back sets of legs and waved its antennae in what Aiden chose to take as agreement. Getting the centipede back into its terrarium took a few minutes, but eventually Aiden managed it. He closed off the top and collected the steel sword from the rack, rolling his shoulders as he limbered up.

Aiden made himself go through a set of strikes and blocks meant for fighting humans, correcting every mistake, before he let himself walk over to the training dummy. He couldn't get careless with his fighting. He started slow on the rolled-cloth facsimile, aiming his strikes at weak points and making sure he hit right before starting to speed up. He was a little rusty, but it didn't take too long before he was striking at full speed, leaving slices through the outer layer of cloth over neck, thighs, gut—

 _Getting into shape so you can kill people for him again,_ Aiden thought bitterly, and put a little more power behind his next blow, despite the warning twinge in his arms.

_Crack!_

Aiden froze and blinked a few times at the training dummy, which he'd just cleaved in half.

"What the fuck," he said helplessly. 

This wasn't some cheap frame hung with rags— it was specifically built to stand up to use from a Witcher. And he'd just broken it— no, _cut_ it _,_ he saw now, the wooden stake and the rolled cloth had been nearly sheared— in two. Aiden took another forceful swing, just to see if it was a fluke. It wasn’t. He could apparently just _cut hornbeam in half_.

“What the _fuck_.”

Aiden had to put down the sword— his arms were trembling enough that he was having some trouble holding it. He sat and stared at his hands. 

_I guess that explains why I’ve felt so much like I did while I was growing all that extra muscle,_ he thought, a little hysterically. _If I can do **that** , what could I do to human bone?_

He shuddered. The mage was going to be pleased.

* * *

Some time later, Aiden was rather listlessly practicing swordwork. He’d gotten mostly back in tone after having been laid up, and he had a much better handle on his increased abilities. He was glad to not be stuck in bed, but he dreaded what use Artorius was probably planning to put him to.

 _Speak of the devil,_ Aiden thought as he heard the secret door open.

The mage walked in a minute later, carrying the expected basket of food and scowling at a letter.

“Why the damned meddlesome mining association has decided to both move the inspection of my mine up _and_ furnish the same inspector as last time, instead of the new one I _clearly requested_ —” he muttered to himself as he opened the door to the outer cage.

Aiden kept from snorting only with effort. ‘Clearly requested’, his left eye. The mage had either bribed or threatened someone, and they weren’t following through.

Artorius paged through the letter, then made a noise of interest. Aiden looked over in time to see his eyes gleam. “Ah. Apparently there is a polterduk causing problems in a mine in Kovir, and as such that inspection has been tabled until the mine can be cleared. All the schedules have been shifted as a result.”

“Polter—” Aiden started, a little confused, but then a memory of a discussion—well, an argument, but a fun one—about localized names for monsters with Lambert clicked into place. “A knocker?”

“I believe that’s what they’re called south of here, yes,” Artorius said.

Aiden sheathed the sword and walked over to the bars. He could tell where this was going.

“Are you certain you’re up for it?” Artorius asked.

“I’m recovered,” Aiden said.

Artorius actually reached through the inner cage bars to cup the left side of Aiden’s face. Aiden’s eyes widened in shock, and he forced his pupils to dilate just enough to notice and tipped his head into the touch.

“Ah, Gib,” the mage murmured, stroking his thumb over Aiden’s cheek. Aiden lidded his eyes. “I have no doubt that you can deal with the monster. But Yolaine’s attempt to interfere cannot go unpunished.”

“I know that,” Aiden responded, purposely mirroring the mage's soft tone. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Body Horror: There's quite a bit of Aiden being unpleasantly surprised by the changes his body is undergoing due to the new mutations; in particular, he ends up losing and regrowing his teeth. Yes, all of them. The most descriptive part of it is mostly in between the first and second line break; just after "There were far too many angry responses bouncing around in his head, but the overwhelming desire to fall back asleep made it easier to not say any of them." and ends right before ""Hasn’t hurt more than anything else,” Aiden said tiredly, and got another horrified look from Artorius.", although there's a mention of his having regrown most of them and his new dentition in the first paragraph after the line break.


End file.
